Travelling to Bruges!

After Christmas, I was really feeling the back to work blues and so my friend, Jen, and I immediately booked a weekend away in Bruges.

We went from Lille Europe via train to Bruges. We had to stop at Courtrai but overall the journey was not a problem, taking around 2 hours.

As soon as we arrived we had lunch, which of course included some Belgian beer...

It was cherry flavoured.

...And then we went sight seeing, meaning we walked around aimlessly all day and ended up in Zara.

The canal

Me and Jen in front of a random canal

The 'Grand Place'

Another view of 'Grand Place'

After the travelling and walking we headed back to our Hotel which was literally a 2 second walk from Grand Place, down a street. I knew I would need a lie down so I attempted to have a nap but I couldn't and we decided to get ready to go out.

By the time we were ready (Literally 10:00pm) we had to run all over the city centre to find a cash-point and a restaurant that was a) open b) looked appetising c) would let us come in. We eventually found one and they quickly seated us and took our orders.

Escargots

Half a Lobster in garlic butter

I tried escargot for the first time for my starter, they weren't in their shells and so I thought the waiter had given me the wrong thing, but as it turned out, the black mushroom looking things were the snails. I was grossed out but they literally just tasted of garlic.

After that we came upon a very loud bar/ club and unintentionally ended up staying until 4am because the music was too good.

Me and Jen in the bar/club toilets

The next morning/ afternoon, we got up and checked out before walking all around Bruges again. We finally had a Belgian waffle for breakfast and it was insanely delicious but very very sickly.

Belgian waffle with nutella

The rest of the day we spent walking around Bruges, the sky was blue and beautiful, we were so lucky. Then, we got the train back to Courtrai and then Lille at around 4pm, which was again, a smooth journey.

There were beautiful monuments scattered all over the city

INFO FOR IF YOU'RE THINKING OF GOING TO BRUGES:

-We definitely went for the perfect amount of time, any more than 2-3 days may get boring as Bruges is quite small.

-The weather can be a bit crazy at times, one second the sky was blue and the next it started hail stoning and they were like golf balls.

-As expected, food and drinks were generally pretty expensive so don't go thinking you'll not spend a lot.

-Everywhere we went they spoke French and English as well as many others- for those who worry about languages.

-There was a small street just off Grand Place, next to the post office that had lots of chocolate shops, I would strongly suggest going because we got tasters!!

-There are not a lot of cash machines around, we managed to find a BNP Paribas that was open late close to Grand Place, but be aware.

- The horse and carriages literally do not care where you are, we were nearly ran over many many times.

-Bruges is a beautiful place, if you're considering going I would say GO FOR IT!!

Florida! - Week 3 in Key West

So this post will conclude my holiday in Florida and for our final week we were in Key West, relaxing and baking ourselves in the hot sun.

Here are some of the photos I took:

The Key West peel-n-eat shrimp is very famous! They literally just boil it and it doesn't have any seasoning because it is so tasty! This was a starter portion so I had it as a main meal and it was incredibly filling.

Mile 0, we went on a bus tour around the island and this is one of the most photographed sights.

This is the view from the top of 'Hemingway's Lighthouse'. It was only 88 steps up to the top but there was no handrail and nowhere to stop, so we were all terrified and had legs like jelly at the bottom.

We went on a sunset cruise on a glass-bottom boat for our final night, we saw turtles and jellyfish and all sorts swimming over the coral reef aaaand...

 

...My Mam's boyfriend proposed to her! My step-sister was being sea-sick over the side of the boat while it happened, poor thing.

As it was the start of lobster season, I finally got to try some! It was so delicious, I had a mixed grill of lobster, shrimp and scallops.

So that concludes my holiday to Florida! We had an amazing time!

Thanks for reading and if anyone is planning a trip to Florida and would like to ask any questions then do not hesitate to ask!

:)

Paris! (Day 1- travelling)

Bonjour !

I haven't blogged in soooo long because I have just got back from Paris! I went with my boyfriend and we stayed with his sister for 6 nights, it's been great and I am gutted to be back!

My next holiday will be Florida which is in about 3 weeks... but I am going to do a few posts about Paris over the next few days and also giving some advice for anyone who is looking to go.

Day One

So to get to Paris, we used the Eurostar. This was both of our first times on the Eurostar train, although I have been through the tunnel in the car before.

We got 2 return tickets from Durham to Paris (obviously stopping at London) for £99 each, which is very good.

I would definitely recommend going via Eurostar as I have flown before but can barely remember and my boyfriend has been to Paris a few times and says he much preferred going by train. The security is very quick and easy and with there being a stop at London along the way, it splits up the journey (around 5/6 hours) and seems to go a lot faster. Also, the Eurostar stops directly in in centre of Paris at Gare du Nord, so we just had to hop on a metro to Place d'Italie when we got there and didn't need to get transfers or anything like that.

All in all, using the Eurostar turned out to be quicker than flying because going to the airport you have to be there early anyway, go through security, hang around in the departure lounge, board the plane, wait for take-off and then finally after 1.5 hours flying, land, go through to get bags, then eventually transfer to Paris.

Anyway, as I said we had to go to Place d'Italie, which is where my boyfriend's sister lives. This was a great area as it was very handy for the metro and close to lots of popular places, but also not touristy whatsoever, which was great.

It did have a few bars which were small and nice too, but we didn't really spend much time around there.

We went to a bar and a Vietnamese restaurant close by called Song Huong and all of us had this:

(Beef with tomato rice, an egg and salad)

It was amazing!!

We basically just went to bed after this, we were so tired and were going to have a big day the next day (I will post about that later today or tomorrow..)

I hope that this post has been helpful, I will be posting more exciting Paris related things very soon!

If anyone has any questions, don't hesitate to ask :)

Catching up...

I haven't been on my blog this weekend but thankyou for the comments and to anyone who came to view it :)

Although I haven't  really been anywhere lately (I'm having to sacrifice a social life for holiday money at the moment), I have FINALLY moved my stuff out of my flat in Newcastle and am officially at home!! BUT on top of that, Gizmo was spayed on Friday and has needed lots of attention. 

We have always had male dogs, and Casper was neutered earlier in the year, but Gizmo was already in season so we had to wait. Anyway... long story short she was eventually done on Friday and was in a lot of pain, although we were told by the vet she would be fine, and we had to go back and demanded pain killers for her.

She's a lot better now, as you can see from her gremlin-like face on this picture!

She is like a baby bat

In other news... my boyfriend brought me back some lovely gifts from New York a few weeks ago and despite the fact I have been to Harry Potter world in Florida a few years ago AND been to the Harry Potter studios in London.. I had never tried any of the Harry Potter sweets!! 

He bought me a little box of the Bertie Bott's every flavour beans, which were....interesting...

Unfortunately I mostly got the gross flavours like bogey, black pepper, vomit, rotten egg, ear wax...you get the idea.

But they were really fun and I'm glad that I can finally say that I have tried them!!

Also.. our Disneyland Paris tickets have finally arrived!! We are going to Paris in 9 days and will be going to 'EuroDisney', I have never been before so I am really really excited :)

If anyone has any suggestions of good places to go in Paris or any good rides/ attractions in Disneyland, please do let me know!!

Thanks for reading :)

Tea in Shincliffe (Durham)

My Dad is going to be moving in with his girlfriend in Durham so he has been taking me and my brother through to explore more than just the picturesque centre. Last night he took us to 'The Rosetree Inn' in Shincliffe and with it being such a beautiful evening there were so many people out and about, it was really lovely.

If anyone is ever in Durham, I'd recommend taking time to go into the countryside, Shincliffe was beautiful and the Rosetree Inn was delicious!

I had a Baked Goats Cheese Salad and 2 big glasses of Rosé to wash it all down, overall a great evening catching up with my Dad.