Liverpool, Cardiff and Oxford

Saturday 26 November to Friday 3 December

We left Pine Lake Resort amidst a huge power outage caused by an extensive storm in NW England. After stopping at motorway services for coffee and a sandwich, we arrived in Liverpool and although it was a bit chilly, the weather was fine.

We enjoyed our visits to Tate Liverpool and The Beatles Story.

The city was very crowded due to a football so after a quick photo op outside The Cavern Club we had to drive a few miles out of town to our hotel.

Pre Covid Neil and I would have been up for a night out on the tiles, researching the restaurant scene, finding some interesting music bars and staying in the city despite exhorbitant hotel prices.

On Sunday we were back though, for a visit to the British Music Experience and The Liverpol Museum. By mid-morning it was snowing. After a snack in the museum cafeteria Neil drove us to Penny Lane, Strawberry Fields and John Lennon's childhood home. Who needs a busy bus tour when you've got google and a few back seat drivers?

We left the cold weather behind us and stayed in Shrwesbury, Darwin's birthplace and spent a few hours in the book town of Hay en route to Cardiff for a visit with Nick and Kerry.

Sunny weather, Christmas markets, good food and wine, great bars and restaurants and a lovely  catch up with good friends.

What more could you want? Obsessively completeing Kerry's giant jigsaw puzzle fueled by cheese nibbling and wine quaffing.

En route back to London we stopped in Oxford for the night and a quick visit to the Ashmolean Museum followed by pub crawling and dinner. We started with posh GnTs at The Alice at The Randolph Hotel but it was downhill from there; luckily dodging Covid in crowded student dives and securing a very late dinner reservation at Browns; everything else being fully booked on a Friday night.