After I moved to the UK, I couldn’t really afford to travel abroad straight away, of course. But on our long weekends, we always tried and still try to just get out and explore another city in the country. I still have a few on my list, such as Edinburgh, Bristol, Wales, and I heard about a small city down south called St. Ives, where you feel like you are not even in England anymore…
To be honest, I’ve been living here in Manchester for 4 years now – and counting – but I still didn’t really see it with the tourist’s eyes…
Maybe it’s time to explore Manchester too?!
I often find articles on traveling websites saying Manchester is the best city to live in blablabla – I could argue with that, but I’m not gonna… I will just pick a day in the near future and go see what all the fuss is about!

Liverpool

I heard nothing about this city, only the Beatles, and I knew that it´s coastal, which means Vitamin Sea – even if it’s only a poor English version without palm trees and coconuts, but…
Maybe if we were lucky enough to have some sunshine that day, maybeee if we were lucky enough to arrive when it´s high tide…then maybe yea, it would have been beautiful.

Crosby Beach – Liverpool

So our first destination was Crosby Beach… We were walking from the city center all the way to the beach. Well, if you’re ever planning to go there, then take a bus from the train station to the beachside, because it is sooo far away, and let’s face it, there’s not much to see outside of the center.
The only interesting thing I can tell you about Crosby Beach is that it is a piece of art, like literally. There are 100 metal sculptures – in the shape of a naked human body – scattered around on the beachside.

They are facing the sea and are placed closer and closer to the horizon. So if it’s high tide, many of the sculptures are fully underwater, yet few of them are just till knee high, or not covered at all. Interesting composition. At first when I saw it from far away I was like: ´oh nice the water must be warm, if people are in it´ and then when we moved a bit closer I thought: ´some of these people look very depressed or suicidal, just staring to the middle of nowhere standing in the water´ … and then I realized they are metal figures… oh well.

It has a very interesting vibe. I tried to Google what the artist meant to show or tell with it, but I couldn’t really find anything specific. Many people were writing different things about the figures, but in my opinion, they are just watching the world go by… low tide … high tide … dusk … dawn… or maybe they are waiting (?)

Formby Beach – Liverpool

´The next stop is Formby Beach, the doors are opening on the left-hand side´
It was a trip for another day, but it started much better. It was sunny, to begin with. The same train trip to Liverpool, but a lesson learned from before… we took the bus from the station to the beach. Well, as close as it was possible, cuz it is not just a beach, it’s like a National Trust area too, so there are no roads after a while, all you can do is hike through the sand dunes and pinewoods. Oh, if you’re lucky, you will see the rare red squirrels running around.

When we arrived, we were actually impressed with this beach, more than we were before with Crosby, because well… it was sandy, not muddy. This was a huge plus. But again, we caught the low tide, so we had to walk like 100 km to reach the water, which was ice cold, so even though I brought my bikinis, only my ankles got wet. What else can I say? Not much.

London, Baby

First time in London, I was very excited about it, but it was a big fat mess, and we ended up with -78£ each – … and counting. I will give you a storytime about this situation later on. So we were 100% sure about going to London for a few days, and it was around Christmas, so we thought it would be just perfect, with the Christmas Market and the lights and… it would be everything. We booked our train tickets, not the cheapest option from Manchester, but definitely the fastest. Return tickets are on sale between 50 and 100 pounds, depending on many things. There are buses too, for like 10£ return… but it takes 5+ hours  – one way –  which is a slow death, for sure.
So the day has finally come, and we started our journey.

… Get the London Look …

Storytime part 1: I’m not gonna leave any cliffhangers here… We left our tickets (including the return one) on the train. We checked in to the hotel,  started packing and getting ready to go out for some sightseeing, and I remember I asked my Bestie:
´ hey, where are the tickets? ´
´donno you have ´em´
´…no, you have them´
And then we gave each other the telepathic look…(or should I say: The London Look) and… Fuck.
We quickly felt relief because we ordered it online, so we got the email with all the confirmation and stuff, so… like come on, probably we are not the only ones on Earth who lost tickets before! Everything will be just fineee…
So we just carried on with the London buzz.
Well, at least we tried to keep up with that, because the public transport is…
Sweet Mother of All that is Good and Pure.
Or should I say: Oh my fuck!?
It was a huge mess… We got lost a million times… But at least we arrived in the center and saw the Tower Bridge from afar.
Bestie lifted up the phone to take the first fucking picture in London and dropped it to the frozen concrete. Thank you.
Broken screen: check. Lost tickets: check. Oyster mess: check. Such a great start, isn’t it?
…And I don’t want to make a huge spoiler here… but it is not over just yet, for crying out loud.

Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, Madame Tussauds, red phone boxes, and buses… blablabla… there’s not much to mention about it, 10 million blogs already wrote 9.5 million times about the same thing, so I will just leave some pictures here:

The Shard – London

But the best part of all – well, at least for me…  The Shard. My favorite building ever in London, it’s unbelievable with a height of 306 m – which equals 95 floors.

I mean… Please.

For like 30 pounds, you can go up to an open-air deck on the 72^nd floor (244 m).
Fuck London Eye (135 m) and Sky Garden (160 m)
Please, for the peace of my soul, if you are in London, choose The Shard, and if you are as crazy about night and city lights as me, then definitely book your ticket after sunset. Of course, a picture is not gonna give back the live view, but…

Storytime part 2: It was about time to catch our train back to Rainchester, so we decided to go a bit earlier so we could sort out our tickets.. So we tried to explain what happened to Cruella De Vil, but she had no sympathy whatsoever, it cannot be reprinted… Bitch NO, the email with the booking numbers, the codes, and the seat numbers are not okay either, like what on Earth are we even thinking?!?! But: We can buy the same tickets for 186 pounds each – she finished with a smug smile.
Mmmkay
How about a few hours later Miss 5 star customer service?
After 20 minutes of negotiating with the Devil, we got new tickets for 78 pound each and managed to get home. Yay.
Long story short, it was an expensive trip altogether. lol

Blackpool

Now, this day was much better. It was nice and sunny, so that’s like 3 brownie points straight away. The beach of Blackpool – or the other name of it is Pleasure Beach – is not far from the city itself, no sand dunes, no pinewoods, no hiking… Which is again, good.

Pleasure Beach – Blackpool

…according to Wikipedia it is inspired by the Eiffel Tower…

We caught the low tide again, but why are we even surprised?! But altogether it was a nice seaside town, and there is a big amusement park too, and many other major attractions and landmarks.
First, the Blackpool Tower. We were excited about that one, cuz according to Wikipedia, it is inspired by the Eiffel Tower. I have to warn you, it is not true. It’s not gonna be the Eiffel Tower…
The Central Pier is nice, it has many shops around, and a big wheel, like Blackpool Eye, we decided not to buy a ticket, but I think it has some amazing views, especially when it’s sunset, and the sun sets in the sea.

…Well, what can I say?  England is beautiful in its own way… I just left my heart under a palm tree on an island somewhere in the middle of the ocean… probably.

Aaaanyways,

See you at the next one,

Noémi

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