I was most definitely not where I thought I’d be at the stroke of midnight. The plan was the same plan my disco partner DJ Scott and I have used for the past few years.
1) Book New Years Eve gig for Lightbeat Laser Disco.
2) Run disco.
As plans go it’s not that complicated and previously has worked it well. Not this year. This year we got a call saying it was all off on the evening of the 30th. Lovely. New Years Eve is always the Big Event in the disco calendar. We even had a brand new PM-1800 Swiss Las multicoloured laser which, naturally, we we’re dying to try out, but it was clearly not meant to be. So what do we do? Well, after what felt like a million phone calls we were left with the evening to ourselves.
So what do you do if you’ve spent all your previous years making the party for someone else?
You do the exact opposite.
So Scott, myself and our respective partners Russell and Inga ended up in a restaurant called Sang Thai in Dorking. If you haven’t been then I highly recommend it, they serve the best Thai food I’ve ever eaten. The service was brilliant, I don’t think I’ve ever seen staff so happy to be doing their jobs and they had also really put a lot into the atmosphere which came complete with glittery cowboy hats for all patrons, party music and free Champagne.
We didn’t stay till midnight, however. We wanted to do something that no one in our merry little group had ever done before. We wanted to see the fireworks and for that we needed a view.
The view from the top of Box Hill durning the day is spectacular. The rolling hills of England stretch out for mile after breathtaking mile. At eleven thirty at night, however, the drive up is quite spooky. The narrow road complete with twisting hairpin bends is crowded on both sides by looming trees which hide any sign of an outside world. We were all trying not to think about it when Russell yelled:
“Hang on. I think this is where the Olympic cyclists rode!”
He was correct and we spent the rest of the drive up looking out for slogans such as ‘Kiss my Cav’ and ‘Go Team GB.’
At night Box Hill is just as spectacular as during the day, but this time it is the lights of the towns and villages below that took centre stage.
We might not have had a microphone to announce the count down over, but between the four of us were can be pretty loud and we may not have had our sound system but Scott had Auld Lang Syne on his iPhone. So we shouted the count down out from the top of the hill and stretched out before us the lights from twenty different displays played themselves out.
I think we had the best seats in the house.
joannerosecarr 