“BLOBBY BLOBBY BLOBBY!!” comes the inhuman screech from deep within the inflated pink monstrosity, its false eyelashes flapping up and down manically. No, I am not describing a scene from ‘The Only Way Is Essex’. I am describing one of my earliest memories.

The portly beast with its perfectly rounded belly lumbered hither and thither, issuing its chilling cry even as it waved in so jolly a fashion. I shrank back and cried. We did not stay in its kingdom of towering and ancient trees, miniature houses, and painted pathways for long. The creature did not stay for long either. Before I ever had a chance to grow out of my fear, Blobbyland would be abandoned forever, leaving a jagged scar in the Morecambe memory forever. Even now, to mention “Mr Blobby”, or worse, “Noel Edmonds”, is a terrible faux pas in my adoptive hometown. If one should mention such betrayers, one should follow it up immediately with an avowal of loathing and a curse upon Blobby’s house - his big, inflatable house.

Mr Blobby first rose to prominence in 1992 after appearing on “Noel Edmond’s House Party”, a popular Friday night television show full of slapstick humour, crudeness, and desperate celebrities. It is unclear what Mr Blobby did for a living before his recurring role on the show. He quickly became a popular fixture, proving that the cultural decline of the United Kingdom did in fact begin before Tony Blair’s Prime Ministerial career, although perhaps only a few years before.

Mr Blobby and his fictional village of Crinkley Bottom would, by 1994, become the basis of two small theme parks. The first was opened in Somerset, which is Down South, so I don’t much care about it. The second one was much more important and interesting, because it was built within Happy Mount Park in Morecambe, Lancashire.

Happy Mount Park is a lovely public park, hailing from the 1920’s, back when we could still have nice things. It sits on the eastern end of the town’s seafront, just across the road from the promenade and its glorious sea views. I spent a great deal of time there as a small child, as we lived about a mile away. We had a family car, but that was for my father to use for work. My mother, who was a childminder during my early years, would walk me and often a couple of other infants to the park for a good few hours of fresh air and play.

The park was beautifully laid out, with mature trees and shrubbery, and inviting paths winding their way through the undergrowth. It had a bowling green, a play park, a trampoline park, and in summer it even had swing boats. The swing boats were possibly my favourite part: equal parts thrilling and painful. I couldn’t go on them all the time as they cost 50p a go, but every time I did ride them, often with my older sister, I would come away with a dizzy sense of ecstasy and rope burns on my hands.

All of those amenities have outlived the disaster that was Crinkley Bottom.

In 1994, 59 out of 60 Lancaster City councillors voted in favour of a £300,000 investment in which Happy Mount Park would have its very own Crinkley Bottom. Lancaster City Council, which also had authority over the neighbouring town of Morecambe, hoped that the attraction would bring around 240,000 visitors each year. Morecambe, as I will discuss in future pieces, had a long and proud history as a popular tourist destination. For a variety of reasons, its popularity had waned over the years. Mr Blobby represented an exciting opportunity to reinvigorate the town’s dying trade.

The deal saw an influx of sponsorship from major brands, such as British Railways and Mars. It was brokered between the council and Noel Edmond’s own production company, the Unique Broadcasting Company Media Group. Edmonds was a huge and popular star, whose presence in Morecambe the year before when turning on the town’s illuminations had brought in over 30,000 visitors – about the same as the number of people actually living in the town. It seemed a gold-plated deal, a sure-fire investment.

It ended in disgrace, with an embarrassing court case that cost the region’s taxpayers a whopping £2.6million. Noel Edmonds, Mr Blobby, and the local council would all go down in Morecambrian history as total bastards. Mr Blobby left, never to return to his soon-to-be dilapidated Crinkley Bottom, which became a favourite stomping ground of curious children and amateur photographers looking for the perfect desolate-yet-kitsch subject for their self-published black and white album.

Crinkley Bottom opened in Morecambe on Saturday, 30^th of July, 1994, and attracted 50,000 visitors by the end of August. Despite such glorious initial visiting figures, there was trouble in pink and yellow paradise. Visitors chafed at high prices and complained that it represented poor value for money; the theme park lacked sufficient entertainment for visiting children. The Happy Mount Park Action Group was formed and created a petition calling for the closure of Crinkley Bottom. It garnered 6,000 signatures and by November, the Labour-led council decided to shut the attraction down for good.

The council, not satisfied with the hole they found themselves in, decided to dig a bit deeper. They sued Noel Edmonds’ production company for breach of contract, claiming that the presenter had not lived up to his side of the bargain. According to the council, Edmonds had promised to visit the site with his special pink friend in hand much more often, and his lack of appearance represented a dereliction of duty.

The case was settled outside of court, with the council paying Edmonds £950,000 in damages. With costs included, the taxpayers’ bill totalled £2.6million. Years later, an auditor would rip the council’s actions to pieces, calling the council “imprudent, irrational, and unlawful” in its treatment of Edmonds and his company. Edmonds was ultimately vindicated by the 2003 report.

I still think he’s a wanker.

Unfortunately, Crinkley Bottom was not the only scar left to itch the Morecambe populace for years to come. My strange and beloved hometown also boasted Frontierland, a much more successful theme park, although it too, has long since closed. Where once was a sprawling “Wild West” themed edifice enclosing a selection of questionably safe rides (Britain’s last wooden rollercoaster, anyone?), there now stand “three outlets” although I couldn’t tell you what they are.

The park had been running for decades as the West End Amusement Park before its owners revamped it as Frontierland in 1986. Wooden rides, saloon-style bars, and cowboys painted here and there to add to the sensation of being on the frontier of the New World. The giant gyroscopic tower painted to look like a packet of Polo mints was less than thematically consistent. The Polo tower remained long after the park shut in 1998, simply because the tower hosted a telephone mast at its apex. As per the contract signed in 1993, the telephone company had the right to keep the mast in place for 20 years. As such, the gigantic tube of mints stood proudly erect on the seafront for many more years, becoming a slightly grotty part of the slightly grotty landscape.

Bit by bit, Morecambe is consuming the carcass of Frontierland. Visit after visit, I see less and less of it. The Polo tower is long gone, as are the saloon-style bars that clung on long after the rides had disappeared. The bars at least provided a way for people to continue to get nice and dizzy, with probably the same amount of vomit involved.

Instead of the ghost of theme parks past, many of us in the Morecambe area are feverishly awaiting a visit from the ghost of theme parks future, AKA, another Q&A session about the proposed Eden Project instalment. Having visited the original Eden Project in Cornwall, I am cautiously optimistic about the plan to build a Morecambe Bay-specific site on the Morecambe promenade.

In a thoroughly appropriate move, it will sit on the former Dome site, an entertainment and leisure complex that is, as you may have guessed, no longer with us. The Eden Project in Cornwall is famous for turning a derelict old quarry site into an incredible hive of life and activity. Several hubs showcase constructed “habitats”, each with their own carefully managed micro-climate. I adore the lush green and variety of plant-life in the rainforest dome, but I struggle to stay in it for long and tend to retreat to the relatively cool Mediterranean zone. With the various immersive areas, it’s a bit like playing the Crystal Maze, except the idea is to actually look closely at your surroundings rather than pretending you didn’t see the Aztec temple wobble when someone breathed on it.

The Cornish Eden Project is global in its styling, allowing the visitor to experience a slice of far-flung places they may never see in real life. My understanding is that the Morecambe version will be a more local affair, which is no bad thing.

The Bay provides a stunning backdrop, although one that very much suits its own moods. The sea is a changeable and formidable beast, and here the English weather lives up to its stereotyping: crashing waves batter the promenade, a dark sky of bruises sending threatening clouds our way; an hour later, calm waters retreat bashfully as the sunshine breaks through an aquamarine sky, white fluff dispersing above our heads, all wrath and chaos forgotten.

The ecosystem here with its many habitats and creatures above and below the water’s surface, the town’s own fishing and tourism industry, the nearby hills and mountains and forests and rivers – all are prime topics to be explored by a new Eden Project. My head swims at the possibilities. If approached with passion and curiosity, as well as a respect for the local area, the project may well be magnificent. I shall continue to watch that space and hope for the best. Perhaps in the future, I will be able to write about an altogether more successful, joyful, and long-lasting theme park blessing my hometown’s seafront. Let’s hope.