IELTS Cue Card/ Candidate Task Card # 156
Describe a time when you had to change your plan due to bad weather.
You should say:
- when it was
- what was your original plan
- why you changed your plan
and explain what new thing you planned and how you felt about it.
[You will have to talk about the topic for one to two minutes. You have one minute to think about what you are going to say. You can make some notes to help you if you wish.]
Model Answer:
We all make plans in our daily life in order to smooth out things as well as to make the best use of our time. But, unfortunately, we just can’t stick to our plan always because of some unavoidable circumstances, just like I couldn’t when I made a plan to take my family to an amusement park a few weeks ago.
Now, going to an amusement park was never a priority for me (and there are a number of valid reasons for it), but it certainly was for my younger sister and 7-year-old nephew. So, when they requested me to take them to the amusement park about a few weeks ago, again, I just couldn’t say “no” to them and shut them off.
So, the plan was made that included buying tickets online well in advance, hitting the road in the morning in order to avoid the big crowds and buying zip lock bags to protect our mobile phones from water rides, among other things. But, of course, we couldn’t plan anything for unpredictable weather. In fact, just when we were about to hit the road in our little, old car to reach the amusement park, sudden heavy rain and thunderstorm overpowered us and messed up all our plans. By the way, in our defence, we did check the weather forecast on TV before making our plans, but then who to tell the weather that it should always behave in the way it is predicted?
Anyway, seeing that we couldn’t possibly get out in that kind of violent weather, our new plan was to just stay at home and watch a nice movie together. Of course, I initially felt little frustrated (but certainly not as much as my sister and little nephew) with the change of our original plan, but when we actually got to spend some quality family time together, while watching a movie, the change in the plan didn’t really seem that bad, after all.