The Boulogne trip was a very educational but enjoyable trip, which definitely boosted my interest in French culture and I would love to go back there someday.

We were expected to be at school by 4:15am but my alarm woke me up at 3:20am! (Way too early, if you ask me). It took time to decipher where I was and what I was doing, but I recovered quickly and soon enough I was getting dressed and packing my lunch into my bag. My mum looked "overjoyed" to be taking me to school at this time of night, as I'm sure the other parents were.

When we arrived at school, we were assigned our groups and given wristbands so that the teachers knew that we were with them. Next, we got on the bus and went to sleep as it was still pretty much the night. We travelled for about 5hrs(ish) but in that time we had had breakfast and a bit of sleep. Then we got on the ferry at around 9:25am - to be exact - and were free to roam around and buy what we wanted (even €40 perfume!).

One and a half hours later, we arrived in France and drove to Boulogne. Our first destination in Boulogne was the ramparts. We walked along them, filling in our booklets as we went. It was a magnificent view from the top, and you could see the whole town so it also doubled as a great photo spot. We stopped at the top of a hill to eat our lunch; unless you'd gobbled it down already (which I do not advise as you would be starved to death by the end of the trip).

After that we visited the cathedral, and - yet again - took lots of pictures. Then, we walked through the Old Town (where we could buy souvenirs if we wanted to, e.g berets or pizza). I found it really 'fascinant' because we got to see all the French architecture and how different it was from English architecture.

Last - but not least - we drove to the long-anticipated hyper market where we could roam around and finally spend our euros on French sweets, ice cream, makeup, cheese, clothes etc. I enjoyed this part of the trip the most because we could use our French in proper situations, and we got to see things that we don't normally get in the UK.

After the hypermarket, we walked back to the coach and set off to go home. When we got to the port, we were held up by security so it took a bit longer to get into the UK but eventually we got on the ferry and managed to finally stretch our legs.

We got back at around 12:00pm but it was worth it because overall I think that the trip was really enjoyable. I would definitely do it again!

- Jemima, Year 7