B-Rizzle

So after my days in Bath, I headed to Bristol.

Got to my hostel around 6ish and it was a pretty sweet room - especially compared to the last place! We had a shower and a toilet in our room, so that was nice.

I went and made dinner straight away and made some friends in the kitchen. The can opener was a biatch to work, but I managed to get my beans open. One of the other guys literally cut open his can of Tuna with the only sharp knife in the place haha.

I made some cool new friends in the kitchen while cooking and then we all ended up in the super cheap bar downstairs drinking till about 12.30am, so that was a good time.

The next day, I got up and it was raining *sad panda*. I had already decided that I was gonna do a Free Walking Tour of Bristol, so a little rain wasn't gonna stop me! I headed up to the meeting place, and turned out I was the only punter on that tour, little bit awkward, but it was fun. I'm glad we still went ahead with the tour because I was only in Bristol for a couple of days, and I wanted to make the most of it. Even though it pelted with rain during spots of the tour, Alex kept trudging on, with me following. We even made a quick stop into Oxfam for me to buy a Brolly. It was a super good tour, and we went all over the place. Over the next couple of days I was in Bristol, I kept passing the places he had taken me and I was all "ohhh theres that again". I got so confused haha.

Some famous painting

Some pretty park

Then I did this.
This being the ss Great Britain. I'm not the biggest naval history fan, but all the guidebooks said I should go here, so I paid my £10, hoping it would be at least half decent, and headed in.

It was actually a lot better than I thought it would be,  it was all in super simple language (hurrah!) and it was really interesting. It was all about how the ship was used to take the people over to NZ and Aussie, so I found it quite close to home haha. And that was the museum side of it. Then I went onto the ship and that was decked out really well too, the dummies, not to my liking so much, but it was quite realistic and we got a free audio guide too, so that put you in the frame of mind of the first class passengers and gave you a tour. That was fun, and kinda weird to see how different the classes were!

And pictures are here -

Read this, then see below

After my exploration of the ship, I wandered up to the shops for a bit, cos there was a craft shop up there I wanted to get to and so after I went there, I went back down to the hostel and chilled out there, cooked dinner, and ended up going to an Open Mic Night (singing) which was long, but fun. They were all good singers (thankfully) and it was nice to just chillax with a new group of friends and listen to some chilled tunes haha. 

And that was day 1 of Bristol.

Day 2 -

I started out by heading across the road to @Bristol, which I had heard was a kids science museum thing. It was pretty much just like a giant Nature Space. It was kinda awkward me being there without a kid, and there were quite a few school groups there and so I just looked slightly creepy. But I still had a good time. This is the kinda place that speaks better with pictures.

This is a senses guy. The bigger the organ/whatever
you wanna call it, the more it senses things. I loled.

I finished up there a lot earlier than I thought,  so I had time to go up to Gloucester Road, which is (or at least was, up until recently) the longest road in the UK of independent shops. So I thought it would be quite cool to wander up there, but alas, it wasn't as good as I thought it would be, and it was just pretty much crap shops, or tech shops. I spent £2.50, so that was pretty good I thought!

After going back to the hostel to have some food, I headed out on some random bus to Clifton. I really had no idea where I was going, so I was quite greatful for googlemaps! So I made it to Clifton - and a few more craft shops round there, before getting a coffee and missioning it out to the Clifton Suspension Bridge - again, all the guide books said I should go there!

I'm glad I did, it was super pretty and quite fun to explore. There was this massive gorge that literally popped out of nowhere - I don't remember going up that many hills to get there at least!

But I got there at sunset, so I had quite a few awesome photo opportunities! And here they are!!!!

So yeah, that all happened.

That night I just chilled at the hostel, watched some TV and hung out with some of my new friends. It was great!!

The next day was my last day in Bristol :(. I got up early cos I had to pack up my stuff, so once I had done that, I went up the road to the Bristol Museum and Art Gallery. It was kinda like their generic museum thing. It was cool, nothing amazing, but they did have a cool Roman Exhibition that was on which was quite interesting, and a cool Egyptian exhibition. Totally English related right? But it was fun to look around and there were some amazing crystals and a great geology exhibition - I find that stuff amazing!

The big building - uni. The one beside it - Museum.

After that, I went up a big tower, on a big hill for a lovely panaromaic shot of Bristol. So with the help of the magical Rusty Potts, here it is -

And yeah. It was sunny!!! It was a nice walk though, it was cool.

Then I walked back down to the waterfront, and Kahu needed some escaping and playing! hahahhaha

 So I went to the MShed which is the museum all about Bristol and their people and places and culture, so that was interesting. I think its more for the people of Bristol, but it was a good look around and I got a reasonable idea about the history of the place and what its been through and stuff.

Wallace and Gromit were created in Bristol

Annnd finally, I went to the Georgian House, which was a house...set up like Georgian times. Funny that!! It was a quick look because it was about to close, but I liked it! And it was interesting. I took a whole bunch of pictures of the kitchen stuff for Mumsy....cos I think about her like that haha.

Generic Arty Shot

So yeah, that was Bristol. I missioned it to get my bags and stuff back to the Bus Station and came back to London. There was heaps of traffic, I literally just fell asleep straight away! It was great!

I'll update on the rest of half term stuff soon, xx

Bath, day 2

Hiiiiiiiii.

So after quite a shitty nights sleep, with the pub below open till late, I got up reasonably early, and headed out. It wasn't the nicest day (bloody England) but it was bearable.

I wandered back down to the Abbey Courtyard, and went on a Free Walking Tour of the city. It was great! It's run by the Mayor, well not him/her specifically, but on behalf of. Our group was about 8-10 people big, so perfect for squeezing inside places when the rain hammered down.

The tour guide was great, we snuggled inside the Bath's first, in their little foyer thing, but it was perfect for us. We got a history of the City and the Bath's and then we walked through the super fancy cafe/restaurant thing there - I wanna be able to afford to eat there!

We wandered all around the city, and our tour guide made everything make sense. We went back up to the Assembly Rooms and poked round, we went to some places that look pretty and have been designed well. We got soaked, we dried out, and then the rain came back again. She pointed out all the great tourist attractions and was a great source of information. It was super cool to be able to have all that for free!

Pictures include -

Oldest Chandelier in the world D:

This is one of the theatres. The big glass structure was built
so they could have a fly floor haha.

After the tour wrapped up, I decided to wander the shops of Bath a bit. They were your standard, British High Street shops, but I found a couple of cute little boutique-y places where I got a few things, so that was nice. 

It started to rain then, so I found a little sheltered seat, and did the proper tourist thing and consulted my guide book about what I should do next, and so off to the Holbourne Museum it was - cos it was free!!

It took me a bit of a walk to get there but I totally managed it. 

It was an Art Museum, which I hadn't realised, but it was good to poke around. They had the poitrait of the Duchess of Caimbridge, painted last year, and its the only showing outside of London this year, stoked I got to see that with no one else in the room! They did a really good job of displaying it too, and had a host/volunteer in the room with a book of the artists other works, that was neat. 

I had a good hour and a half poke around the museum, so I suppose it was worth it after all. 

A soap sculpture in the bathroom, super duper cool!

Then, I was pretty exhausted, so I decided I should head down to the train station and off to Bristol, it was only a half hour train ride so that was pretty sweet and easy to manage with all my stuff!

I'll do a Bristol post tomorrow, I gotta finish looking at all my photos first haha.

Bath, Day 1

So, Saturday I spent cooking and packing and stuff. I made a Stir Fry and a salad to take in Tupperware and put in a cooler bag to take with me. So I was well prepped and good to go!

Sunday I had a reasonably early morning, and got up and managed to get all my stuff downstairs (and watch the last bit of X Factor, before heading off to the stunningly gorgeous (read: gross and scungy) Victoria Coach Station.

Hopped on my bus....and off we went!!

I don't really remember a lot, I think I slept a whole lot, and then when I woke up I saw a sign saying "Welcome to Bath". Huzzah, I made it!

I got off the bus, and cabbed it to the hostel at first, so I could (as mum would say) get my bearings. Bath is pretty small, so I managed to do that in one five minute cab ride to the hostel. The hostel was above the bar...it wasn't amazing....but more on that later haha.

So I meandered round the town a bit, but it started to BUCKET down big time, so in the middle of the torrential downpour, I walked up the hill (HILLS!! It made me feel like I was home. There is a serious lack of hills around here) to the Fashion Museum.

It was a really cool museum. They gave you a free audio guide, which, for the first exhibition, literally had like a 15 second commentary for each garment - which was perfect, there was more info on the walls if you needed it. The first exhibition was about how the museum had been open for 50 years and it showed the best 50 garments that they had collected over that time.

I also did a 20 minute tour there, and it was really good! It was great to have someone bring the garment to life and had some really interesting stories, especially about how some of them were worn.

Pictures speak louder than words, I took lots, but here is a small selection -

Add caption

This was one of my fav dresses in the exhibition. Versace.

This is the oldest complete garment in the whole of Great Britain.

Burberry is good for the soul.

This dress makes me question life.

This is an old school dress up.
Someone went as a champagne bottle.

 The Fashion Museum is also home to the Bath Assembly Rooms, which is where the poncy folk of Bath (including Jane Austin apparently) went to smoke, and play cards and be poncy and socialise.


So after my fashion-ista-ness for the arvo, the sun was out. Huzzah! So I headed back down to the city centre and went to the Abbey while it was open for an hour that afternoon (considering it was a Sunday). Gorrrrgeous! I like old church's/abbey's/cathedral's and this one was super preeeeetty.

I quite like this pic, It was my attempt at being Arty

The Candle I lit

Awww, Poignant shot

And then, cos it was sunny, I went walking. Bath is so old and pretty and photograph-able. So I took lots of pics. And heres a couple. (Also remember, that I am a Potts. And taking photos of pretty things run in the genes. Thats why Dad takes so many photos of me :D)

Bath Rugby Ground. WOOO RUGBY!

As well as a Potts, I am Nicola's daughter, and so I go prepared anywhere, with too much of anything, and most of it is food. So I took a photo of all the food I took with me. I made a Stir Fry the night before to eat on the bus for lunch, and a chicken salad for dinner, and I also roasted 4 potatoes so that I could just stick them in the frying pan and they were good to go! Yay me!

So I shall leave you with a picture of food.

Good night!