If you've been following my blog for a while, you'll know that myself and Reece love to travel and see new places. With my birthday coming up in March, we decided to go away for a few days and fancied trying somewhere new. With a little help from my Instagram followers, we decided on York. York is somewhere that Reece has never been before and I slightly recall passing through York on a school trip when I was a kid, but I've never visited properly. As always, with any trip, I like to prepare well in advance to ensure we don't miss out on anything we would have loved to see. We're visiting York for four days, so I have planned out each day with the attractions we'd like to see and I also have some places to eat lined up. I'm really excited for this trip, it feels like forever since we went away together!
Pictured - Novotel York Centre hotel
Monday will be a lot of travelling in the morning, as we have to catch a train from Carlisle to Newcastle at half past eight and then change trains, where we are expected to arrive at 11am. I already know this is going to be a long morning. We travel back and forwards to Newcastle a lot as we fly from there, and the train journey is extremely boring and feels like forever. I'm sure we'll be grabbing some breakfast before we board to eat on the way. Our transfer in Newcastle is only 10 minutes, so we're cutting it quite fine and will have to be really quick. We've never had a transfer with such a short amount of time before, so I'm going to be a nervous wreck until I get on that second train. Once we are in York, we can't check in until 3pm, so we will have a good amount of time to kill. I think we will probably wander around York and find our bearings in a city we've never been to before. After we have checked in and unpacked, we will go out for some dinner. I have a few different options for meals, but would love some suggestions if you have any! Once we've ate, we'll probably come back to the hotel for a swim before bed, ready for the next day. I purposely look for hotels with pools as we both love to swim and there really is nothing better than getting back to your hotel after a long night and just relaxing in a swimming pool.
Pictured - Levis, Vans, Guess, Kate Spade, Coach and Tommy Hilfiger
Tuesday will be all about the York Designer Outlet. When we first started looking at where to go for my birthday, Chester was an option as I really wanted to go to Cheshire Oaks for some shopping. After a quick Google search, I found that York also has a discount designer outlet. The outlet is only a 15 minute bus drive from our hotel and has so many shops! It has a lot of shops that we love to shop in, but aren't close to where we live, like Tommy Hilfiger and Levis. I'm looking forward to spending some birthday money here and treating myself! There's also a Wagamama which has became one of my favourite places to eat, so we may even have an early dinner here. I think visiting here will probably take up most of the day, so when we head back to our hotel it'll be straight to the pool!
Pictured - Bettys Tearoom York Cruise, Yorks Chocolate Story and The Shambles
Wednesday is our only day where we have the entire day in York to explore and start visiting attractions. I really want to visit 'Yorks Chocolate Story,' a museum all about chocolate and how York came to be the home of chocolate making in the UK. You can also make your own chocolate which I am really excited about and there is a cafe and gift shop, which I can imagine I'll be spending some money in. I also would love to see The Shambles, it literally looks like it's been taken straight from a Harry Potter movie! After looking online, it looks like there's many independent shops and places to stop for coffee and cake, sounds right up my street! Talking about coffee and cake, I was recommended Bettys by the lovely @cactiandcocoabutter, a tea room where they serve afternoon tea, scones and cakes. After looking this up online, I definitely want to visit here for afternoon tea! Weather permitting, we also want to go on a river cruise down the River Ouse as we done this in Paris and it was gorgeous! Such a nice time to be able to take in everything that is around you and relax. I'd quite like to do this in the early evening when the sun is starting to go down, I think it would be lovely.
Pictured - York Art Gallery, York Minster and York Castle Museum
Thursday is the day that we go home, but we don't have to leave York until nearing 8pm for our train. We do have to check out at 12pm, so we will probably leave our luggage at the hotel (if we can) so we're not carrying it around York all day. On Thursday we will be seeing the sights we haven't gotten round to yet. This will include the York Art Gallery. We've really started to enjoy visiting art galleries, since we visited the one in Edinburgh and the Louvre, we seem to have got this new appreciation for ancient art. I also love how peaceful an art gallery is! The next thing we will do is visit York Minster. I'm not sure yet if we are going just for a browse or whether we are going to go up the Minster, as it's actually quite expensive to go up! Either way, this is one I am excited for as York Minster is so iconic! We will also be visiting the York Castle Museum as this looks incredible, a little old fashioned street inside the museum there are actual shops! We don't arrive back in Carlisle until nearly midnight, so I think the Thursday is going to be a long day for us.
I can't wait to see York and spend some time with Reece away from my home! I love that we travel so much when we are together, we haven't even had this trip and I'm already thinking about our next one.
I'd also really like to try some new places to eat. We will of course be going to Wagamama to make the most of being close to one as we don't have one in Carlisle and I have found a little cafe called Brew and Brownie that sells pancakes and waffles for breakfast, so we will definitely be trying there! If you have any recommendations on where to eat, they would be very much appreciated and please leave them down in the comments! If there is anything that you think is a must do in York that I've also missed off the list, please let me know!
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** Disclaimer: All views and opinions are my own. All photo credit goes to Google Images**