Birthday fun on a private island!

Earlier this year I felt rather disappointed to discover that the EU Referendum fell on my birthday. I knew I’d have to do something pretty special to take my mind off it! I wasn’t keen on Glastonbury this time (even though I had an amazing time there celebrating my 40th birthday) but when I spotted a competition on the Kiss FM website to win tickets to ‘Impulse Island’, a private Charli XCX gig hosted by Impulse, I knew that was right up my street. The prize included transport to Osea Island in Essex, an overnight stay and all food and drink – as well as a mini festival. It was a tiebreaker competition with 15 VIP winners, and I was super excited to get a winning email!

Barely anyone I knew (apart from my 12 year old niece!) had heard of Charli XCX, even though I’ve been a fan since 2014 – but I knew my friend Laura would be up for the occasion! We met the rest of the guests at Westfield Stratford and boarded two coaches to take us through the floodwaters (worrying for the coach driver!) to the jetty near Osea.

It took the Impulse team a while to get us all onto our boat, so we managed to sneak in a quick birthday beer (and a couple of packets of promotional Walkers Crisps of course).

The boat ride was a little damp, but luckily we’d been given goodie bags with a purple Kiss poncho. Stylish!

15 minutes later our boat moored at Osea Island and we were led through the trees to a swimming pool, where we were given cocktails and lunch. Some of the girls were brave enough to jump onto the cute pool inflatables, but as our overnight bags had been whisked away to our rooms I didn’t want to risk a splashdown!

After lunch we went over to the mini festival, where we could get our hair and make-up done, drink more cocktails, do Lucky Voice karaoke, make floral headbands, play table football, hula hoop and roller disco.  I’ve not worn roller skates for 30 years – and I didn’t even fall over!

In the evening the storms arrived, so we headed into ‘The Bomb Factory’ to shelter and get ready for Charli’s gig. She took the stage in a tiny room at 8pm for about an hour and she was brilliant – new songs, the hits (‘I Don’t Care‘ and ‘Fancy‘) and a couple from her first album for the superfans at the front. It was an intimate, fabulous experience, and we all loved the finale!

A photo posted by Natalie (@nattybeamz) on Jun 23, 2016 at 2:18pm PDT

A photo posted by Impulse Fragrances (@impulse_uk) on Jun 25, 2016 at 5:44am PDT

After the show, the day guests were bussed back to London while the VIPs and winners were taken back to the cocktail bar for more free drinks and dancing, although after a couple of glasses of wine we decided to go back to our cosy cottage, Puffin Burrow.

Next morning we woke to bad #Brexit news but beautiful sunshine, so we hopped on a couple of bikes to explore the island.

After a lovely breakfast, we had a sit by the pool and a final mooch round the island – I’d love to hire Osea for my own private party one day!

Sadly soon it was time to board the coach again – this time we were driven off the island (only possible at low tide!) and dropped off back at Westfield. As it was such a glorious day, we wandered over to the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park to check out the brand new slide round the Orbit, which only opened that day. I hadn’t been to the Park since winning a trip to the Olympics back in 2012 and it was great to be back!

As we were wandering up to the Orbit, I heard a nearby tannoy announce: “Would you like to win a ride on the slide?”. YES! I yelled, before realising that this might be a complicated task. Laura and I slipped off our shoes and mounted a giant gameboard along with Dave and Vicky, and we proceeded to play an adapted game of Snakes & Ladders – Slides & Steps – with a giant dice and some super tricky True/False questions about London!

Twenty minutes later I emerged as the winner and found myself zooming up the Orbit in a lift – what an incredible view it is from up there!

I had a slight panic when I saw the padded headgear and sleeves the riders were putting on, but I went for it and yelled, laughed and screamed the whole way down. It was a fantastic 40 seconds!

Unfortunately, they didn’t allow cameras on the slide, but you can see a video of Ferne McCann on the slide on YouTube:

Whew! What a birthday adventure, all thanks to comping. I wonder what delights my 43rd birthday will bring…

(thanks to Laura, Natty & Impulse for the extra photos)