One of my best friends in the UK announced last year that she was getting married, so Shae and I recently paused our 50 state road trip to attend the wedding.
We decided to make the most of our time back in the UK by visiting several cities and spending time with family and friends. It was a fairly busy – yet relaxing – 11 days, so here’s everything we got up to.
Day 1
We flew overnight from Boston to London (check out our review of the flight with Delta here) and arrived early on a Tuesday morning. After picking up our rental car, we drove to my parents’ house in Haslemere.
Tuesday is one of my days writing for Frequent Miler, so I spent a fair bit of my day working on that and one of my own sites – GC Galore.
As a result, we didn’t do much else that day, although we did make time to head to Dylan’s, a local ice cream shop, with my sister and parents.
n.b. I’m not entirely sure why it looks like my Dad’s doing a Popeye impression in the photo below 😉
Day 2
The morning started off well as I made myself a bacon and egg sandwich. Bacon and bread are two things the UK does better than the US, so I always have this whenever I return home to the UK.
The plan was to then visit the Devil’s Punch Bowl, a large park near where my parents live. We had a little bad driving luck on the way though and burst a tire.
While my dad waited for the AA (UK version of AAA) to fix the tire, my mum, Shae and I walked to a nearby coffee shop for a cup of tea and biscuits (cookies).
The tire was replaced in under an hour, so we were soon at the Devil’s Punch Bowl.
The Devil’s Punch Bowl is almost 700 acres, so there are all kinds of areas to explore. We did the first half of Route 639, a 6.39 mile loop in the park. Despite it being open to the public, there are several homes in the Devil’s Punch Bowl. The one below was pretty quaint-looking and was called Gnome Cottage.
The last part of our hike was fairly strenuous as we had to walk up a steep section.
The four of us made it to the top and took a final photo before heading back to their place.
Later that afternoon we got to pick up one of my nephews from school and saw my niece, brother and sister-in-law.
Day 3
For the last year or so, Shae’s been following The Daily Hobson, a dog on Facebook who’s owned by someone in a photography group Shae’s part of.
They only live about an hour from my parents, so Shae was able to arrange a meet up with Hobson and his owner.
We stopped off at a nearby farm shop afterwards and had a hard time escaping without buying everything in the store. All their pies, rolls and scotch eggs looked delicious:
I ended up getting a pork pie, a pork and apple scotch egg and onion bhaji scotch egg. The onion bhaji scotch egg went well with the Indian takeout we had for dinner that night.
Day 4
I’d arranged to visit my old workplace that afternoon to catch up with former colleagues. Before that though, Shae and I took my nephew and his girlfriend out for lunch at Pizza Express. It had probably been 10 years or more since we last ate there, so we were looking forward to it.
I got the Pollo Forza pizza which had chicken and spicy peppers and was absolutely delicious.
We forgot to get a photo of the four of us after lunch, but thankfully Shae remembered later on while I was visiting my old office, so she got one of the three of them.
While Shae waited for me to get back that evening, my sister’s cat kept Shae company. Padme even sat for a photo shoot with Shae.
Day 5
Our 5th day in the UK was the reason we were there – my friend’s wedding.
The wedding was at Arundel Town Hall. It was built in 1834 and looks like a cross between a castle and a church, so it was a beautiful location.
The service was beautiful as well and it was awesome getting to be there for Louise and Brian’s big day.
After having drinks and canapes, Shae and I went for lunch with some of my other childhood friends and their families. All the photos we got have their kids in them, so here’s a photo of my lunch from the Beefeater instead!
After checking in at the Comfort Inn Arundel so that we wouldn’t have to drive back to my parents’ place that night, we made our way to the evening reception.
We had fun at the reception, including getting some photos in the photo booth they’d hired for the evening.
Day 6
After checking out of the Comfort Inn Arundel, Shae and I drove into Arundel town center to have a quick look around.
It’s a stunning town, with historic buildings and even a castle which sadly wasn’t open that day.
On our way back to Haslemere, we stopped off in Petworth. We’d driven through Petworth on our way to Arundel the previous day, so Shae wanted to return to take some photos.
The UK is full of historic churches, with this one dating back to the 1200s.
Seeing as we’d be heading up north the following day, we went down the local pub that evening with my parents, sister and nephew for a drink and dessert.
My sticky toffee pudding was topped with what might look like a Golden Snitch, but is in fact a physalis. Even though physalis sounds like it’s the name of some kind of erectile dysfunction medication, it’s actually a small fruit that was surprisingly tasty.
Day 7
Our time with my parents went by quickly and it was soon time to leave.
Our destination was Ellesmere Port, a town just outside of Liverpool in the north of England. We were there to visit one of Shae’s friends who she went to university with and who came to visit us last year in Montpelier, Vermont. We stopped off in Stratford-Upon-Avon for a few hours though to explore William Shakespeare’s birthplace.
Like Arundel, Stratford-Upon-Avon is a stunning town and so I’d recommend visiting there on a trip to the UK if you want something to do outside of London. Check out this post to see everything we did in Stratford-Upon-Avon, but here’s a picture of Shakespeare’s birthplace to whet your appetite.
Day 8
Day 8 was Tuesday again which meant I had to work. Shae therefore went out with Stef to visit Chester, a city in nearby Cheshire.
Chester was founded in 79 AD, so it’s a very old city with lots of history to take in.
After wandering around Chester Cathedral…
…with its Lego cathedral replica…
…a walk along the canal…
…and checking out the Eastgate Clock…
…they went for lunch at Artichoke cafe.
The UK is very pet-friendly, so dogs were allowed in the cafe. That was helpful as they’d taken Stef’s dog around the city with them.
In the evening, Shae and Stef went to see Mr Lumpy and friends, a cete of badgers that visit someone’s backyard in the evening. There’s a photo of Mr Lumpy below, but be sure to check out this post Shae wrote about the experience.
Day 9
Shae and Stef went out in the morning to get scones at Debenhams, a department store in the UK.
They also went to a thrift store to pick up some fascinators for the 2019 Kentucky Derby we’ll be going to in May.
That afternoon, Shae and I drove over to Blackpool for a few hours.
This was our first time visiting Blackpool, so when walking along the seawall we were surprised to see rows of steps so close to the water. I’m assuming they were built there to help protect against coastal erosion, but it was definitely a new sight for both of us.
After playing on a 2p machine in an amusement arcade…
…and having a quick drink in Las Iguanas…
…we went for dinner with Alison and Andy. Shae met Alison in Jamaica a couple of years ago, so arranged for us to meet up when we realized we’d be relatively close by.
Day 10
Our penultimate day in the UK didn’t go quite as planned as Shae and I both ended up spending much of the morning and afternoon working on stuff so that we could enjoy our time in Amsterdam. We did find time to go for lunch at Las Iguanas with Stef though.
Then in the evening Shae went with Stef to watch Cole graduate from puppy school – good job Cole! Similar to Padme, Cole also had a photo shoot with Shae.
Day 11
Shae, Stef and I headed into Liverpool for our final full day in the UK. Despite supporting Liverpool FC since I was a kid, I’d never actually been to Liverpool. It was therefore great to visit Anfield stadium, but I sadly couldn’t get tickets to the Liverpool vs. Spurs game that weekend.
Having parked near Albert Dock…
…we started walking along the River Mersey where we saw some of the city’s iconic buildings…
…got to see The Beatles…
…and went for lunch at Wagamama, a restaurant chain that we need more of in the US.
Finally, we met up with Heather who used to be in the youth group Shae and I helped lead back when we lived in the UK. She’s now older than we were at the time which made us feel really old.
Liverpool has dozens of uniquely painted Lambananas throughout the city. As the name suggests, they’re sculptures that are a cross between lambs and bananas (as you do). We met up with Heather at the original sculpture – the Superlambanana!
After saying farewell to Heather, we drove back to Stef’s house to pick up our suitcases for the ~4 hour drive south to Heathrow Airport.
We were flying out the next morning, so had booked an overnight stay at the Hyatt Place London Heathrow Airport so that we wouldn’t have far to go in the morning.
Loved all the pictures. Thanks for sharing.
Thank you – glad you enjoyed them!