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A day in Grasmere

A day in Grasmere
When you live so close to the Lake District, it can be easy to forget what a beautiful place it is to visit. I don’t visit it anywhere near enough, and each time I do I promise myself I’ll be back soon, which usually turns into many months later. The problem is that a lot of the time the weather isn’t fantastic, and when it is it becomes overrun with tourists making the roads busy and parking difficult to find. Luckily, I had the perfect opportunity to visit recently. The skies were blue, it was a weekday and it wasn’t yet the school holidays, so I jumped in the car and headed for Grasmere. View Post

Home Sweet Home, Manchester

Home Sweet Home, Manchester
I think that brunch might be my favourite meal of the day. In fact, if I lived in a city and wasn’t spending as much money visiting places I could quite easily get into the habit of going for brunch every weekend. It’s nice being able to have a lazier morning, enjoy a big meal and then not worry about eating for the rest of the day, but still having plenty of time to do things. I also think that brunch is late enough in the day that you can follow up your meal with some cake, whereas breakfast is just a bit too early for that unless it’s a special occasion. View Post

Evuna, Manchester

Evuna, Manchester
A few years ago before I was about to visit Spain for the first time, I made the mistake of admitting to James that I was worried about the food because I didn’t like tapas. He hasn’t let me forget it since, although I will now willingly admit that I really like tapas. Before I had properly experienced it, I thought it was all olives and calamari and other things that I would prefer not to have. However now I’ve been to Spain, and had tapas in the UK multiple times since, I can confirm that whilst I may not love those specific dishes, I definitely do not have a problem with tapas generally. Which is why I was pleased to hear that we would be going to a Spanish restaurant while we were in Manchester for the weekend, although it gave James another opportunity to tease me. View Post

Review: Brunch at York’s Bakery Café, Birmingham

Review: Brunch at York’s Bakery Café, Birmingham
One of the best things about booking just a room in a hotel, rather than bed and breakfast, means that it gives you the opportunity to go out for breakfast. I love going out for breakfast or brunch, although I usually find my appetite is three times the size of what it would be if I was just having breakfast at home. Anyway, given the fact that breakfast wasn’t included in our room tariff, and the time of our trains, it made sense for me and James to go out for brunch when we were in Birmingham and following a recommendation from a blog we headed to York’s Café. View Post

A Weekend in Birmingham

A Weekend in Birmingham
Birmingham is not somewhere I had ever really imagined going for a weekend away. Admittedly my only experience had really been changing trains at New Street Station, but it seemed large, overcrowded, noisy and the sort of place that I would usually try to avoid. However, it is a useful midway point between the north and south of the country, so a weekend in Birmingham was on the cards. A trip to Cadbury World was top of my list of things to do, but I hadn’t realised the abundance of other things that could easily fill a weekend. View Post