‘Oh my God they haven’t changed at all,’ went up the cry as someone put their head into the PE changing room.

And we were off… sixty odd women returning to the site of what to us was Pate’s Grammar School for Girls on Albert Road, (and to others is now Pittville School).

The visit had been the idea of the infectiously enthusiastic old Patesian Tamsin Mitchell, who thought it would be fun to return to our old school 40 years after we did our O levels.

The school holds many special memories for us not least because our intake (1980-1987) was the first to not finish our education at the Albert Road site. We had to pack up and move after the lower sixth to become one, as it were, with the boys’ grammar based at Princess Elizabeth Way.

Social media comes in for much criticism but without it how else would it have been possible to bring so many women together, many of whom had had little if any contact over the past 40 years?

After all, life has taken us in a variety of directions: across our year we have teachers, a dentist, a holiday let proprietor, a nurse, a human resources manager, a journalist, a baker, and the proprietor of a dog hotel. One of us is even a harbour master but she couldn’t make it (busy time of year for her, sadly).

And many are also mothers and home makers and excellent ones at that.

While the majority have remained local (ish) people had travelled from all over the country to make it – from Cornwall to Yorkshire and Derbyshire to London.

And so with the common dominator of having been at school together, in we streamed to the canteen on a fiendishly hot Friday afternoon, many putting their head timidly at first around the door until the first ‘oh my god it’s you’ welcome and arms opened wide for a hug.

It wasn’t solely old girls who came along – so too did two of our old teachers – Caroline Mackenzie, who taught us games and our former biology teacher, Miss Cook (now Ceri Smee).

After a hastily necked cup of squash and a sticky name label applied to the chest should time have had made us slightly less recognisable to one another, we began our walk back in time around the school.

The current caretaker gamely tried to herd us in the right direction with the air of a sheep dog who realises he got the tricky flock.

Every room brought a fresh memory and normally a good dose of laughter.

Revisiting the spot where the register was called to determine who was going swimming provoked the most giggling.

In our day, swimming in the unheated outdoor pool was never a source of joy – but for girls there was a get out clause. The question was could you face shouting ‘period’ when your name was called out for the swimming register.

Plenty of us could. Every. Single. Week.

The swimming pool has long gone but the joy of revisiting the school we left so many years ago, was how much remained unchanged. The airy corridors, the tennis courts and beautiful playing fields, the sturdy old radiators around which you could wrap yourself on a cold day. The traffic light system on the headmistress’ office – green: ‘enter’ orange: ‘give me a sec I’m finishing my coffee’ and red: ‘Go away’… or words to that effect.

The visit ended at the school hall and a chance to sing the school song, very slightly altered to remove some wording that hadn’t stood the test of time.

It has to be up there with Jerusalem as a rousing anthem and standing on the stage we belted it out, as we did at the end of each term.

At the last word sung Tamsin shouted ‘three cheers for the school holidays’ and ‘three cheers for the teachers’ – and there it was, a moment back in time. We were all once again 14 and about to spend six weeks doing very little.

The evening continued at The Retreat in Cheltenham – a site familiar to many of us at a time in our lives when perhaps it shouldn’t have been.

It was a chance to catch up some more and comfortably take up where we left off all that time ago.  

In the spirit of honesty, while many had incredibly fond memories of their time at Pate’s, not everyone remembered it as a happy time. But the reunion proved an opportunity for some to mend bridges and hopefully a chance to lay past ghosts to rest.

Richard Pate was a man of vision – Tamsin was a woman of vision for organising this get together. There were truths shared, friendships rekindled, bonds reformed. And I challenge anyone who says their life isn’t better for having gone along.

LUCY ELKINS