As you'll have noticed, I've been a bit awol recently, you'll have seen in my most recent post (My Weekly Round Up ) as well as over on instagram and twitter that I took a wee trip down to the warmer climate and much more interesting city of Manchester & village of Leominster. I thought I'd write a couple of posts with all the pictures & things that I got up to while exploring a new place - starting with this one about Manchester.

I planned this trip almost a year ago with my little sis Eleanor for the sole purpose of going to a concert. Yes, we're those types of fans who actually travel to see bands - it sounds more obsessed than we are, I swear. But instead of just going down for the night, we decided to make it into a small vacation and explore a bit of the city. We flew down Monday morning, arriving in our very budget hotel (we're in money saving mode for our next holiday this year to Maga) by lunch time, giving us almost 3 whole days there.

We've been to Manchester for a couple of long weekends before, so knew a few places that we wanted to go. We mostly spent the days exploring the shops that Aberdeen doesn't have to offer, and made ourselves at home in the Northern Quarter where all the vintage shops were. We spent the whole time wandering about, getting sore legs but feeling like we actually saw the city.



The buildings were one of my favourite things about Manchester. The first time I visited, we stayed a bit out of the city, so saw a lot more of the industrial side, but through all our walking we discovered some awesome artwork adorning the buildings. It's such a change from the grey buildings that I'm so used to in Aberdeen, and a lot more edgy / modern than the grand old buildings of Edinburgh.




We made an effort to explore a bit of China Town as well, which I found fascinating - its like a different city within the city centre. The smells from the restaurants were mouth watering, although I'm ashamed to admit the menus in Chinese intimidated and confused us too much to actually step in. The architecture again  was incredible to see, and added so much light and colour to the area.





In order to celebrate Eleanor's 18th fully, we drank every night we were there, testing the many different bars and pubs that the Northern Quarter had to offer.. I'd have to recommend Night and Day, a really edgy little bar where we had our first drink of the week as well as The Turtle Bay, which was  a little pricier but was where we had some Caribbean cocktails to toast to the end of the Manchester part of our adventure.



Tuesday night was spent at the concert. Usually a whole post would be dedicated to a concert, but the photos that we took were, to say the least, a little blurry from all the jumping around, so I'll incorporate it into this post. We were seeing the band 5 Seconds of Summer, a band who we've loved for the last few years, and have already seen 4 times before. The concert was absolutely fantastic, and our seats were floor seats fairly near the front, so we had a great view of the boys. The set was really good, despite missing two of my favourites from the album, but we were up & singing along for the whole time. And I'll even admit that I got quite emotional during Beside You, where the crowd sang the last chorus back to them, and you could see the proud look on all of their faces - its truly an incredible feeling being surrounded by people singing and enjoying the band along with you.




Our last day, Wednesday, turned out to be a scorcher, and was possibly my favourite of our time there. We went Manchester Museum, which can be found in the university campus. I was shocked that Eleanor even considered going to a museum, let alone stepping foot inside one, but I think she did end up enjoying it. There was an exhibition on Easter Island, which I found really interesting as its not something I've studied much before, as well as having an area with live amphibians and reptiles - something I've never come across in a museum, but really enjoyed. After spending just over two hours here - a record for Eleanor - we then spent some time relaxing in some gardens beside the campus, with a punnet of strawberries and cherries to get some vitamins back into our bodies after only eating junk food.





I absolutely loved these four days that we had in Manchester; I kept saying to Eleanor how grown up and independent I felt being on a holiday without our parents, and managing to negotiate airports, train stations and buses all by ourselves. I loved Manchester, and really want to get back to explore some more. The two of us have already decided to do a little road trip around the UK next year and actually get to know the country that we live in, so a return visit will be in order.

Have you got any places in Manchester or the UK that you recommend visiting?

Love,
Emily
xxx

ALSO: THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!! I have somehow managed to reach 1000 followers on bloglovin for this little blog. It started out as a little project but has really grown into something I love and want to spend time on. It's been an incredible year & half, and I can't wait to see where it goes.  Thank you to all my lovely followers for getting me to where I am today - you are all brill. 

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