we were treated to the Swiss delicacy of fondue, which turned out to be quite scrumdidilyumptious, although by the end of the meal people were struggling to finish. Early the next day we embarked on our journey to CERN, the fascinating centre where the Large Hadron Collider is based. We were told about ALICE (one of the detec- tor experiments), the CERN Control Centre (CCC) and the general build-up to a proton–proton collision. We then had lunch, which was agonising. Not only did it take a large chunk out of people’s budgets, but we waited and waited… Eventually, after everyone was served and had eaten, we headed to the exhibition part of CERN. Overall, it was fascinating, but it was the room with the tesseract mechanism that had the most kids and adults lining up. We waited till 3 o’clock for it to begin and we were all leaning right over the wire in anticipation, only to be met with a quite boring – sorry, wonderful – and fast demonstration of a 4-dimensional shape. Only Yingjie Ma managed to pull himself through the whole show, fighting the battle to stay up for 45 minutes filming the tesseract. We made our last day in Switzerland an unforgettable one. We tirelessly packed our suitcases and had our last buffet breakfast. We then marched to the Jet d’Eau and watched it with fervour – possibly the quietest any DC group has ever been. The highlight of the day was the escape room. We were split into groups and Keith’s Kool Kids were given their pirate briefing. Working together in perfect synchrony, we managed to complete the puzzle and were first out – a moment never to forget. We had not only come first but we had done it as a team. ◉ SENIOR SCHOOL SKI TRIP – AUSTRIA OSCAR KINIRONS (YEAR 12) • FEBRUARY 2024 During February half term, 22 boys from Years 11 and 12 travelled to the snowy Austrian mountains for seven days of skiing in Flachau. This year, the trip coincided with the boarders’ ski trip, which made it particularly memorable. Each day, we had five hours of tuition with an additional hour of free skiing on some days. Everyone worked hard at their skiing and enjoyed the delicious mountain food at lunchtime. Fortunately, conditions were near perfect every day with excellent snow cover in many areas of the mountains. On a few days snow fell whilst we were skiing, making it even more special. By the end of the trip
156
THE ALLEYNIAN 712
Made with FlippingBook - Online magazine maker