Bath Christmas Market

Merry Christmas! How did it sneak up on us so quickly? While I'm still holding out hope for a white Christmas here in England, I'm starting to come to terms with the fact we might only see rain. This winter has been beautiful, and I have to admit a lot has to do with the wonderful Christmas markets that occupy every city centre at this time of year. After sharing my wonderful experience at the Manchester Christmas Markets, I had to share my photos from another fantastic Christmas market I visited this year... BATH!

Everyone had been telling me I needed to make a trip to Bath for the Christmas Market. I had been putting it off because of my crazy busy schedule but when I realized it was closing the 14th of December, I quickly booked a train ticket and headed down for the last night of the Bath Christmas Market. Each Christmas market has a theme. Bristol's is drinking, Manchester's is eating, Bath's is crafts. I was amazed by the amount of local businesses selling cute little crafts and tid-bits. I wanted to buy it all but restricted myself to one ornament. Self control is key when visiting any Christmas market, don't you agree?

Merry Christmas!
xoxo

Manchester Christmas Markets

German Christmas Markets are still a new and exciting concept for me. This is only my second winter in England and I remember last year wanting to spend every weekend drinking German beer and eating German sausage. It was an expensive winter for me obviously. 

J's attitude towards German Christmas Markets reflects many of my English friend's thoughts: "Once you've seen one market, you've seen them all". I had started to believe that was true. Each German Christmas Market I stumbled upon was starting to lose its appeal. But then I visited Manchester.

Spread out around the city centre, Manchester hosts a total of nine Christmas markets. NINE! I was overwhelmed and excited and eager to see them all. Each market is within walking distance of each other, and if you're feeling particularly festive (as I was) you can follow the Manchester Christmas Market Trail. 

Click here for more details!

Happy Thursday!

xoxo

Manchester in Pictures

A few days ago I packed my bags and headed to Manchester. I spent hours and hours wandering around, falling in love with the city. I even met up with a friend I hadn't seen in TWELVE YEARS! Needless to say, I loved Manchester so expect lots of post coming your way!

Happy Sunday!
xoxo

The Largest Castle in Wales | Caerphilly Castle

Despite the fact I had lived in the UK for over a year I hadn't really visited a castle. Well, I have. In 2011 I visited Edinburgh Castle, but that was years ago. Since my "big move" last September, I hadn't made a single trip to a castle. Obviously long overdue.

Caerphilly Castle was chosen as our destination based on serious research. Pintrest research of course. Elle stumbled across a few pictures of Wale's largest castle via Pintrest and I was sold. The trip out to the castle seemed easy enough (we're notorious for having at least one horrible public transportation experience per trip). We headed to the train station one rainy morning and booked our tickets to Cardiff. Cardiff seemed unusually busy when we arrived. I'm talking police every ten feet patrolling the crowds busy. Turns out the International Rugby game AND ComicCon were taking place in the city that day. Our luck, right? We maneuvered our way through excited rugby fans and comic book characters to get on another train that would take us to Caerphilly. 

Caerphilly, only about 20 minutes north of Cardiff, was a charming little Welsh town. Like many towns with surviving medieval fortresses, the entire city is practically built around the castle. A five minute walk from the train station and we were there. 

The largest castle in Wales, Caerphilly Castle sits on an island surrounded by a moat. Yes, an actual castle surrounded by an actual moat! It is largely in ruins thanks to the generous bombings that took place during the English Reformation (this is me rolling my eyes at people in the past disregarding the importance of sites such as this one).

Having made our trip in November, we practically had the castle to ourselves. Tickets to Caerphilly Castle are only 4.50, an absolute steal if you ask me! We spent the majority of our day wandering the deserted corridors, laughing our heads off at the hidden statues (especially the one in the mirror room)! Wellies/rainboots are a must, especially if you go in the winter months!

Happy Thursday!
xoxo