Out and Out in Paris and London

I'm sorry, that is a really pathetic pun on the book Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell that I vaguely remember reading for English at school. I just couldn't resist the blog post title as, with the visit to a lesbian bar in Paris and then the brief look in The FairyGothMother shop it did feel like a bit of an 'out' weekend.

As I mentioned, the reason for being in London for some considerable time was because our train back wasn't until 10pm so we had some time to kill, which always sounds rather wasteful and, in fact we made good use of the time by meeting up with Misae Richwoods who I'd got chatting to on Twitter (@minxymoggy). She'd suggested meeting at Spitalfields Market which is somewhere neither Rachel and I had been before but once we got there we wished we'd known about it before.

Basically Rachel was in hog's heaven as the place is packed full of the latest bleeding edge style with market stalls for designers to sell their own creations. It really was quite inspiring and I wish I'd had the money left after the holiday to afford several things that I saw!

Anyway, I think Rachel managed to chat to quite a few people about photography and we also had some valuable help and advice from Misae as well as all three of us having a really nice meal and a few cocktails to boot (Happy hours is fantastic). Will have to head over there again when next time I'm down in London and maybe this time get to spend some money on some fantastic clothes.

Paris

Seems so long ago but it has only been a week since we were sat in the lesbian club drinking mojitos and looking at the fantastically stylish people around us ... and sticking glow-sticks down my bra (yeah, one to many drinkies on my part I think). Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself!

The trip started at a reasonable hour on Thursday, from a rather cold York train station with us both rather laden down with bags containing camera equipment and, for me, a ridiculous amount of clothes, make-up, and assorted shampoo, conditioner and other bathroom 'essentials'. I travel heavy!

We had a nice trip down to London, then carted all our bags across London to first go to Rachel's GIC appointment (stopping off for lunch at a nice little pub first where I gleefully remembered I could actually have a drink in the middle of the day since I didn't have to drive at any point over the weekend!). Though against my usual 'rules' of footwear (and style) I was wearing walking boots which frankly was the only sensible option, I'd have very poorly feet if I'd worn my other kind of boots!

Getting to Kings Cross St Pancras and we had a pre-trip Starbucks before going through the check-in and security - same as airport setup but nowhere near as busy or time-consuming! You go through French passport control on the way out as well, bit odd as we weren't in France yet (nothing in Paris in this respect at all). We didn't have to wait long before they opened the doors to let us up onto the platform so we could get onto the train.

The trains are a little dated by today's standards but they are quite comfy and the legroom is reasonable. I was cheeky and got some plastic cups from the lovely man in the buffet car so Rachel and I could have a drink of wine on the trip (thought I'd start how we meant to go on)! Also thought it might pass the time a bit but really the journey doesn't take that long, you're only in the tunnel itself for 30mins tops and the rest is spent speeding across the French countryside - seems faster than on the UK side.

We found the hotel without any issue (I have Rachel-Nav) and set off out to take some pictures of Paris at night. Walked what seemed to be miles (or kilometres) and got back to the hotel late once we'd reach the point of being rather cold and tired. We did make a slight tactical error in that we set off with the intention of a certain route that avoided an area near the hotel that the guide suggested we stay away from. Of course we ended up wandering into it and only realised after a few clues like the condom machine fastened to the wall and the woman who must have been rather chilly given she was wearing a almost invisibly short skirt, stockings/suspenders and a big coat. Rachel described the area as "less that salubrious" though I guess it still had a certain ambience! Thankfully we got back onto the main road once we realised our mistake.

Slow start in the morning and ended up having a lovely brunch followed by more wandering round Paris all the way from Notre Dame along to the Champs Elysée stopping off to have a lovely drink and cake on the way. After taking pictures of the the Arc de Triomph we decided to head back to the hotel via the metro to avoid more tired feet. A quick doze at the hotel was followed by venturing out to the gay/lesbian area of Paris, a quick bite to eat (along with some nice wine) and then one of the local bars. A few drinks were followed back a stagger back to the metro and then back to the hotel.

The following day the weather was a little more on the rainy side so we took the metro to the Champs Elysée and found a nice restaurant to have more fantastic food! Thankfully the rain cleared while we ate so we could do some more wandering around afterwards and eventually headed to Musée d'Orsay so we could see a bit of art and also be somewhere nice and warm!

We were both enjoying the warmth and excellent photo opportunities when Rachel's camera stopped working! Neither of us have ever had any problems before but in this case the memory card could just not be read which was all a bit of a disaster! Thankfully Rachel was able to use my camera to carry on taking pictures and, in the end, when we got back home I was able to retrieve all of her images anyway.

In the evening we got dressed a little more smartly and headed towards the canal (not far from the hotel - useful given the shoes I was wearing) and had a lovely meal (and wine) before heading back to bed for a nice hug and sleep before having to get up early in the morning to head back to the UK.

Trip back was equally rapid and uneventful. Nice to be able to see the country-side this time (it was dark travelling there) and at least we knew when we were getting close to London as Rachel pointed out various landmarks. Got back, dumped bags at left luggage and then headed into London to entertain ourselves until our trip back to York at about 10pm! I'll leave all that for another blog post.

Legoland and Windsor

It's taken me a while to get around to posting further pictures and commentary on the holiday with my son as I've just been so busy! I'll cover this weeks activities in another post and for this one concentrate on the fun from the holiday.

We've done the Legoland trip a few times and we've managed to stay in the Marriott hotel in Slough each time which is good because of it's location and ease but also because I'm still clinging onto Gold status so get access to the executive lounge (didn't actually make any use of that this time but it's still nice to have). We also go with the same plan each time; head into Legoland to go to the shop on the day we arrive and then do a full day afterwards (saves the distraction of buying Lego getting in the way of enjoying the rides etc).

We had really nice weather for the Sunday we spent in Legoland and, armed with my son's camera (well his Mum's) I got a few snaps of some of the things you can see on the rides. I had to take a picture of the scarey Tarantula since my son is so fond of reminding me that I'm scared of spiders (and heights).



We didn't do that many rides and this one was fairly sedate but did at least show off the models that there are in the park. The Legoland Village is actually quite an impressive sight as well (no pictures this year, got plenty last time) and it still fascinates my son which I think is quite impressive considering he normally likes doing activities more akin to running around than looking at things.

One ride we did go on, having queued for some considerable time, was the log flume, better known as "Pirate Falls" at Legoland. It's years since I've been on one of these and I agreed simply as it was the lesser of many evils - as I mentioned above I'm scared of heights so what I can deal with it pretty limited when it comes to roller-coasters and such rides. I'm not bothered about getting soaked though and we did the Viking ride last time which actually was alot of fun.

I wish I could post the picture they took of us going down the Pirate Falls, it is an absolute classic. My son looks absolutely terrified but, if you look carefully you'll see that at least he is brave enough to have his eye's open, I couldn't even manage that! I was telling him, and myself, all the way up that we'd be find and just get a bit wet and that it wasn't really that high. Right up to the point that we started to tip over the edge ... and then I realised that I really am absolutely terrified of heights and just clamped my eye's shut! The txt from my son's Mum summed it up quite succinctly: "Wimp!".

The following day we headed into Windsor with plans to go on the big wheel there - you can guess that we didn't for the reasons mentioned above - and visit the Castle as my son wanted to see this and the soldiers. I suspect I looked like a bit of a tourist while we went round Windsor Castle, can't think why though.


Before coming down to Windsor my son had, rather perceptively, remarked that I "wouldn't pay for seeing the Castle". Not entirely sure how he picked up on that but I guess I haven't hidden the fact that it rather annoys me having to pay to see something that we (as British tax-payers) essentially own or at the very least contribute to the up-keep of. I think my far-from Royalist attitude comes from my Dad but I think I tend to take this view independantly as well.

However, a few things changed my mind about this. For one thing you can now get free admittance to the castle for a whole year for the price of the entrance fee which seems quite reasonable to me. Also they had opened the Moat Garden and that was frankly beautiful and amazing to see.

The other thing that really made feel the visit was worth the money, was my son's reaction to the inside of the castle. He was obviously taken by the armour, guns, swords and other things that I guess boys will always be intrigued by but he was also fascinated by the coat of arms on the ceilings of one of the halls and we spent a good 10minutes trying to look for our favourite ones. He spotted some really interesting ones and it really was amazing to see him totally interested in something completely unlike the usual things.

Before we had gone in the castle and taken the bus tour (see previous post for the affect on my hair of that little trip), he'd been feeding the Swans on the Thames and I got some lovely pictures of him and them. I particularly liked this one:


I really can't put into words how much fun it was to have a holiday, even such a brief one, with my son. I simply can't describe how proud I was of him or how much it meant for me to be walking around holding his hand and having him chattering away and being such a smart, intelligent, funny, interesting, kid. There are just no words to describe how FAB he is!

Legoland!

Finally got round to uploading the pictures from Legoland Windsor!

We had a fantastic two days there and managed to get on at least some of the rides the second morning we were there but after lunch there was little chance of that as the place was absolutely packed and the queues were horrendous!

Just a practical note for anyone wanting to visit; I would highly recommend the annual pass which, as the website states, is less than the cost of visiting the park twice and obviously allows you to go back as many times as you want over the course of a year. For myself and my son the cost for both annual passes came to about £118 which is an awful lot of money but not too bad when you consider that we can go back, say, next April and summer and there are no extra costs for rides once inside the park (though food is expensive).

In terms of hotels to stay at, we were in the Marriott near Heathrow/Slough simply because I had points that I could use to pay for that. There is plenty of accommodation around the area so no big issues there.

Anyway, we had fun and I'm sure we will be going again at the earliest opportunity :D