Holiday booked, but it's the caravan for us this weekend!

So our holiday abroad for this year is booked and after spending a long time in the travel agents trying to decide where we wanted to go, we chose the place we initially liked the look of from a brochure before we had even set foot in the place, typical!

So now Caron and I are going to be visiting Madiera at the beginning of June. It's kind of a shame that we both couldn't stretch our budget to a few hundred pounds more  and go to the Greek Island of Skiathos, a place I visited a few years ago for my friends Mark and Sarah's wedding. The reason it's a shame is because Mark (my best mate) and Sarah will be working at the same resort for six months later this year so it would've been nice to have my friends there on holiday with me, even better is that Mark would have been pulling/serving my beers to me, what more could I ask for. Alas, it's not to be......unless I somehow found enough money from somewhere for a second holiday this year, unlikely!

This weekend Caron and I will be going to our new caravan holiday home for a long weekend for my birthday, looking forward to it. It's even better because Dan (Caron's nephew) and his girlfriend Sammy are joining us for a couple of days and we always have fun with those two!

In other news, I'm moving shifts at work, back to my old shift for three months to cover whilst someone is on long term sick, it'll kind of be a bit of a nice change although it's messed a few things up which I had planned, so a bit of rearranging and booking of days off was needed. Fingers crossed it doesn't end up being a permanent move though!

Just lately I’ve been thinking about a a story I wanted to write with vague hopes of becoming a published author. It’s a comic- sci-fi fantasy and I started the planning phase for the story about 4 or 5 years ago. It just popped into my head again out of nowhere, probably because of my desire to actually write a book and a yearning from my creative side which tends to get pushed into the recesses of my mind by my lazy side. 
Maybe if I actually follow through with this I could have a story published which people might want to read, maybe it would sell well enough for me to build my ultimate man cave, ideas for which I’ve started collecting on Pinterest. That’s a fantasy in itself but in the near term I better start working out some story ideas!

The pictures are ones I took in Skiathos, showing two of my favourite taverna's, Stamelos Bar and Portobello bar.

Finally visiting my birthplace - York

To say York is the city where I was born, it's a real shame I hadn't properly visited the great and scenic city before!

I had done a booze cruise down the Ouse before, kind of a works night out and I had run a 10k around the city center a few years back, in fact that was when I realised I needed to come and pay a proper visit!

Caron and I chose to take the two hour bus ride from Hull which wasn't too bad and late on the Sunday morning we arrived in York, We didn't have to check in to our hotel until 14:00 so headed to Lendal Cellars for a beer in a subterranean vaulted cellar. It was a beautiful, gothic environment to enjoy a pint of ale or a glass of wine in Caron's case. Not only that, it was very warm on what was a very cold day!

We then headed back out into the cold to explore a little more, meandering the city streets checking out the shops and more potential watering holes. A short while later we discovered The House of the Trembling Madness, set on three floors, the ground floor being a shop selling all kinds of craft ales and beers, a visual treat in itself, shelf upon shelf of tipples from all over the globe. The basement was again beautiful in itself and this floor was dedicated to spirits from here and there. The top floor was a fantastic if small bar and looked wonderful in it's medieval environment, the crap taxidermy adding to this with great effect. We stayed for a pint but as it was full to the brim with people from all over the world eating and drinking we had to settle for the little bench at the top of the stairs to rest our feet.

We had to move on of course and headed back out to explore the streets, taking in the famous shambles, a small collection of higgledy piggledy buildings down a narrow street which transported you right back to the middle ages. 

We had to check into our hotel of course and it was time to head there. We wanted to make the most of our time and have a proper night of it, so after checking out the room and dropping our things off we headed back into the center and two a great but overly expensive bar called Missoula which had it's own terrace overlooking the river, far too cold to make use of at this time of year though so we took a seat by the window. 

We later visited the pubs along the river, the ones you see in the news every few years because they have flooded, and the marks where there on the walls in the pub (the Kings Arms I seem to recall) showing where the river level had reached over the years.

We walked again visiting a few more places before finishing our evening in ....................... drinking wine before walking back to our room.

The following day my lady wanted to do a bit of shopping so after checking out of our hotel, off we went again, at least it was more opportunity for me to take photo's, after grabbing some things here and there we needed something to eat and paid another visit to ......................... for lunch, Caron having................... and me choosing ............... and I got a fantastic ...................... a fantastic concoction of IPA, whisky, ginger ale, lemon and ice presentd in a metal tankard, very refreshing.

After our lunch we visited the National Railway Museum for an interesting if slightly geeky look around, although it did provide some great photo's!

Finally it was time to get our bus back home to Hull, a great couple of days!