London

How can we not go to London since we are already in UK? :)

We decided to drive down for a day trip from Manchester. The drive takes around 3.5hours and including the rest stops, the total journey to and fro is 8 hours!

This means we only have a very limited time in London! :( 

Initially the guys planned to go to Stonehedge but was advised not to as today is a public holiday and it will be very jam packed there, so they just decided to go for a city tour and then meet le bf's client for dinner at night to catch up and also talk a bit of business.

We parked our car at St Pancras Train Station.

This picture is very cute cos Ryan said:

"Brendan! Your girlfriend bully me!"

I asked him to carry all our Starbucks cups to throw. Haha!

We bought tickets for the "Original Bus Tour" which includes unlimited rides on the double deck bus and 1 cruise ride down the River Thames.

We put ponchos on the seats cos it was drizzling!

But we were lucky cos after a while the sun came up and the weather was gorgeous! We have lots of blessings so far on this trip.. Sunny day in London is a rarity! ^_^

We are on the London Bridge and the bridge in the background is the Tower Bridge.

Tower of London

I expected the Tower of London to be much bigger.. 

Ice cream in cold weather! Mad love!

Nom nom nom!

Kitty with the smallish Tower of London.

The books I read described it to be "majestic, grandeur, blah blah."

But it's so MEH to me. 

I was hungry so I made le bf buy me Fish & Chips! 

We shared one set cos it's mega huge!

Tower Bridge

It looks pretty, but very underwhelming. 

Many people mistake this for London Bridge..

After Ryan & Janiyce bought some souvenier (both of us did not buy any), we went to take the cruise down the River Thames. :)

Good seats at the back! ^__^

Underneath the bridge..

This is the London Bridge. Meh right?

Cleopatra's Needle

London Eye

Westminster Abbey! 

Big Ben!

Us at Big Ben :)

Trying to capture the lion behind. Success! Yay!

We ended the tour at Harrods! 

There were lots of places which we didn't manage to go.. Like the Buckingham Palace, the Harry Potter Studio tour, etc. I hope we can go back again so I can explore London more throughput!

We only had 1hour15mins at Harrods cos we need to rush off to meet le bf's client for dinner at another place. Super sad cos the place is so huge and beautiful and sells so many stuff!! There's a huge mega Burberry down the street but we don't have time to go! Mad sad. :(

Lots of tea!

Chocolates!

MAD PRETTY INTERIOR!

Olympics are coming so lots of themed products..

I AM SO HAPPY COS THERE'S LADUREE!

OMG!

It's a brand from Paris and they sells one of the best macaroons in the entire world! Pierre Hermes is better but Laduree is definitely up there in the top league!

Secretly took a shot cos no photos are allowed.

Le bf bought 12 pieces for me! It's around SGD4 per piece!

Harrods is at Knightsbridge, so we took the London Underground from Knightsbridge to Leicester Square where the restaurant is.

The train tickets are exhorbitant! It's only 4 stops but they charge GBP4.30! That's SGD8.60!! Now Singaporeans please stop complaining!

In the very expensive train ride..

The restaurant is fabulous! Looks expensive but prices are reasonable!

The area is called "West End" and there are lots of musicals! Wicked, Lion King, Shrek, Singing in the rain.. SHUCKS! I really wanna watch a musical or two but THERE IS NO TIME! God dammit! I made le bf promise to bring me back or to New York's broadway.

Group pic!

Paul James, Nicki, Me, Janiyce, Ryan & Brendan

We took the London cab back to St Pancras instead of train and it ended up to be much cheaper! Only GBP11! OMG. 

The only thing le bf and I bought are macaroons from Laduree and cheese from Harrods. There is blue cheese with truffle, cranberry cheese, truffle cheese and more truffle cheese. Le bf is a die hard cheese fan + truffle fan so he cannot resist the combination of cheese & truffle. There were hundreds of selections of cheeses in Harrods but we can't possibly buy them all. Why can't Singapore have such a selection? Dammit. The big piece of cranberry cheese is only GBP5! Madness!! I can't find it in Singapore except in P.S Cafe where they charge an arm and leg for a small piece.

We did not buy a single souvenir (keychain, magnet, etc) except some postcards to send to XY & Yaya who requested for them and also to his family. He is not a shopper and I can't be bothered cos it's really expensive and I have stopped buying nonsense stuff after throwing so much of my possessions away when I moved from Boon Keng to Serangoon. Sorry to my friends who expects me to buy gifts for you from London. =X

Tomorrow we will be going to Liverpool! I am very sleepy.. gonna crash now. Good night y'all!

Blackpool

We drove down to Blackpool today! Well, le bf did the driving. Heehee!

They googled for a place to visit last night because we did not know where to go. I am glad we went to Blackpool because it's so beautiful! It is a quaint little town in the North West of England, located just beside the ocean. 

Lots of amusement parks, strip joints, casinos, entertainment can be found in this area. It reminds me a little of Las Vegas, English style. :)

We arrived around 1pm as we went to the English countryside to take pictures (earlier entry) and only had around 4.5hours to roam around as the carpark closes at 5.30pm. Yes, a bit lame I know. We just walked along the beachfront and out onto one of the jetty. 

On the long stretch of jetty, there are little shops selling snacks, drinks, icecream, etc. We went into a traditional sweet shop and bought lots of yummy truffle chocolates there for only £2.50 per 100g! :)

Le bf posing outside the shop

Ryan & le bf

Resting in the shade with Janiyce :)

The tower in the background is the Blackpool Tower.

We can't go up cos it's under renovation.

I saw the word "Spuds" and I went "KANTANG! YAY!"

With lots of cheese and butter. Yums!

Om nom nom!

We had a mini lunch at one of the seafood stalls..

Lobster tail, oysters & crabsticks! Yums!

Bought some postcards.. ^_^ 

Pretty postcards!

Proof that I sent them in case they are not delivered! LOL!

Afterwards we drove back to the city of Manchester where we were staying and tabao-ed Macdonalds for dinner! Macdonalds is very expensive here so I don't think it's worth it.. But all the supermarkets are closed, so we can't go and buy provisions to cook.. Hope we don't eat Macdonalds again. I rather cook! :)