We all went out again to see the spider leave Liverpool.
Here's the last still pics that I took. Had to switch to the video camera, as the snap camera is useless outside after dark.
We knew that had returned to it's nest on the Concourse tower, and would probably move as dusk approached. We got there at 18:30 and stood on a traffic island between St John's shopping centre car park and St George's hall and waited.
Spotted a couple of friends who live on the Wirral waiting nearby, so we shouted them over and had a chat. The Penny Farthing pub was blasting out music. Every now and again the DJ played the spiderman theme from the 60's cartoon.
Around 19:30 the French chaps in the fancy fencing jackets - I've since learned that they are called "Les Manipulateurs" - abseiled down from the top of the building, and strapped themselves onto La Princesse, as the spider is known.
The monster then slowly descended, as musicians mounted on cherry-pickers arrived and played. Gradually the creature was lowered to the ground, then it slowly turned and began to move along William-Brown street.
We watched it go, with the musicians leading the way, at which point darkness had fallen, so I switched to my video camera. We decided to dodge around the back of St George's Hall and meet up with the creature on the other side. We lost our friends, but I think that they opted to follow the spider in the other direction, as they hadn't seen it yet.
We stood at the back of a line of people and watched the musicians go past, then saw the spider coming. This time a number of "Les Manipulateurs" were leaping onto it's legs and allowing themselves to be carried up into the air, and back down again.
The spider became interested in the people sitting on the walls of the hall for a bit, then came right past us.
There was enough of a gap at the back of the crowd to walk along, so we found ourselves once again walking with the spider. I walked along with a small boy on my shoulders and holding up the video camera, whilst keeping pace with the arachnid, which was putting on a spectacle as it hissed and sprayed the crowd.
Down towards the Queensway tunnel the crowd got a lot thicker. We managed to squeeze our way into a spot beside the roundabout where the final action took place. We had to alternately pick up Frodo and Samwise for short periods, to make sure that they got a view of the action.
We really felt the heat of the flames that frightened the creature into leaving, and were doused by the water cannons. There was a fusillade of fireworks, and then it began to snow. The spider squatted down, curled up and began to disappear into the tunnel.
Frodo and Samwise were waving goodbye frantically. Samwise was sobbing, and tears were rolling down down his cheeks because he "didn't want the spider to go". He kept on waving and crying as I held him up, right to the end - people were nudging each other around us and going "aahhh!" when they saw him.
Finally around 22:00 it was all over, the spider's snow was still falling, and the music still playing as we headed back to the bus station. Feeling a little guilty for letting the boys stay up so late, but really glad that we'd managed to go out as a family four times to see this marvellous creation, since it's unlikely to come here again.
I'll have to get the video off-tape and post some here sometime.
There's loads of good pictures on the La Machine website. I'm off to buy the poster and the T-shirt.
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