Hey Guys,
So last week I had such a fun trip to Brighton with my
friends Naomi and Alice. It was a pretty spontaneous trip. I had the idea to
get out of London somehow and after binge watching Zoella’s vlogs, I decided
Brighton could be a really lovely day trip! I haven’t been to Brighton since around 2010, when my first boyfriend lived there for Uni. I used to visit almost every other week! It felt nostalgic but also great to be back in the little town by the sea, creating new and longer lasting memories with my gal pals.
Here is a round-up diary style blog post about what we got
up to. If you are thinking of a day out of London or even a trip from farther away,
I hope this post will provide you with some inspo or even some nostalgia if you
may have visited before!
I’ve labelled each section so you can see what it’s about
and skip along if you wish (this is a long ‘un)
OK, let’s go!
Tuesday 3rd
May 2016
10am –The journey
begins
Was up fairly early to try and make the most of this
beaauutt weather! *Emoji heart-eyes face!* The sun was shining brightly as I
made my way to London Bridge station to meet the girls. I was last to arrive
(as usual) sigh, but it was lovely to see everyone and how excited we all were!
The train took about an hour, and after watching the cityscape
view evolve into the beautiful countryside, we arrived safely at Brighton
Station.
11am- Priorites!
The fresh sea air literally hits you as soon as you exit the
station. Perhaps a local may be accustomed to the salty whiff; however our
foreign noses revelled in this new and refreshing smell that brought back so
many memories of near and distant memories.
We made our way down the main hill leading to the station in
search of a snack for Naomi and a bathroom for Alice! We found our way into
Holland and Barrett’s to pick up a snack and then Waterstone’s bookshop to
cheekily use the 4th floor cafe loo!
11.30am- Homesense
Snack √
Bathroom stop √
Onto the main event; Shopping, Sea and Sun!
First thing I noticed was a large Homesense on a corner. Now, I only know about this store because of
Zoella (there is only one in London and I live on the other side of the city)
so I was very intrigued to check it out! I hadn’t realised how closely related
Homesense and TKMaxx were. They are owned by the same company and extremely
similar. Homsense is basically a homeware-only version of TKMaxx (the best bit
of TKMaxx if you ask me!)
We had a loonnngg rummage through every single department
and toyed with buying so many things! Only thing stopping me from buying everything
I saw was the thought of having to carry it around for the rest of the day L
I managed to grab myself a wooden chopping board. I know, I know “why would she get that?” but
hear me out. So I thought it would be a nice idea as a serving board/platter
for cheese and bread and nibbles etc when I have guests over. Kinda rustic and
homely. Haha, I’ll post a picture of it when I get to use it to show you what I
mean.
Anyywayy, after an hour of browsing, we all made our purchases
and decided to head out to the infamous “Lanes” for some shopping and a meal.
12:30pm- Sweets!!
The Lanes were easy to find. They were very European-style,
narrow, winding streets of cute little shops, boutiques and restaurants. We
found ourselves in a sweet shop (oh I
wonder how that happened? Not my fault!) It happened to be the same one
that featured in a recent Zoella vlog with her pal Mark Ferris. I remember it because
they were making this joke about ‘Diablo’.... (Btw, you will realise throughout this diary that our Brighton journey
seems to echo a lot of Zoella’s videos! Not even on purpose because I have no
idea where we were at every given moment! It was fun getting lost though)
The sweetie shop was really old school and traditional. It
smelt amazing but because we were quite hungry, it was super hard to restrict
ourselves! So we decided to get a proper meal and do sweets later.
 |
| Sweetie Shop! |
1pm- Mexican Lunch
and Cocktails
A few more shops along, past the alluring Blackbird Tea
rooms, we spotted a “2-4-1 Mexican” sign and were immediately sold! Basically, among
our group there is 1 vegetairan, 1 pescatarian, 1 gluten free and 2 dairy free
(none of which apply to me haha) so it can be hard to find a place we can all
eat, but the ‘Dos Sombreros’ menu
seemed to cater for us all nicely!
 |
| The menu |
Naomi and I ordered cocktails at two for £11.95. We decided
on a “Mexican Woo Woo” which was SO tasty and pretty strong! We were nice a
tipsy for the arrival of the main.
 |
| The "Mexican Woo Woo" |
The portions were nice and big. I went for
an Beef Enchilada, while Naomi went for a packed Burrito and Alice some stuffed
peppers. We all had the sweet potato fries on the side which were fantastic. I
feel like sweet potato fries are always hit and miss depending on where you are
eating; but these were yum!
 |
| My Chilli Con Carne Enchilada |
After stuffing ourselves, we head off to continue our
journey around the Lanes.
2.30pm- Shops and
Shocks
Ok, so I love all of those small, gifty type boutiques that
you get everywhere. I think they are full of great little gifts and fun
presents for family, friends and yourself! From funky fairy lights to quirky
colouring books, these shops have you covered! Rant: My only problem with
these places are how overpriced everything is. Even though I saw those flamingo
sunglasses in Primark for a pound, I have to purchase them for £8 from you? Or
those fun mugs that are all over Pinterest are priced at £15 here? Maybe I am
just really stingy but I always feel like these places are only really for people
who can afford a larger budget for novelty birthday pressies that may only be
used once...
This is why I love Tiger! Tiger is one of my favourite shops
ever for everything! From kids a toy to kitchenware, this shop has it all
covered and the Brighton branch certainly didn’t disappoint! I managed to pick
up a really cool table dish for throwing jewellery and bobby pins etc.
2.45pm- I can See the
Sea!
We finally made it down the the beach for a well earned sit
down and chat whilst the waves created a wonderful soundtrack to our rock
hunting...
I decided to create my own rock “collection” to take home,
so Alice and Naomi would present rocks to me and I had to accept or reject them
like some kind of beachy next top model!
 |
| My new friend "Rocky" |
3.15pm- Afternoon Tea
It was a little chilly by the sea, so after a while of
sniffing and dodging seagull poop, we decided to head off to find our next
tourist landmark-the Pavilion. Of course, the shops en-route weren’t left
untouched as we found Lush! I even
bagged myself a free hand massage from one of the nice staff members as we
talked all things rose scented and unicorn horns!
 |
| Lush; If only you could smell the screen! |
We found the Pavilion and had a walk through the little park
opposite.
Alice is another avid herbal tea drinker so we decided to find a cafe
for something to help digest the settling Mexican.
We stumbled across the Brighton Theatre and the built in
cafe. The alfresco seating was super cute so we ordered and sipped whilst
watching the shoppers and students. There was also a street performer who
created huge bubbles with some long sticks and ropes which turned out to be
fairly entertaining to watch!
4.30pm-Photobooths
and Vintage Shops
We decided to try and locate the North Laines, as it is full
of cool vintage shops and also a photobooth place that I had read about online
and seen in another of Zoella’s vlogs. I thought it would be cute as a little
memory of the day. As we wandered around the North Laines, the retro stores and
vintage boutiques were all slowly closing. We found our way to Snoopers
Paradise and had a really nice rummage around. Snoopers Paradise is a large
market-style store with lots of different sections. There were a few clothing
areas but it was mainly full of bric-a-brac, tins, pins and vintage things! I
managed to find a sale section (bargain queen as always) and picked up a copper
coloured tray. It was super shiny on the bottom, but the top was faded and
matte with a little rust spot. But at only £1, I thought I could take it home
and spruce it up! I had seen these on blogs/Instagram before and really liked
the look of them as a tray to toss little bits on. (Since this trip, I have spruced it up so will take a nice
photo and leave it here:
We also had a go in the photobooth at £3 for four poses. We
darnt use the straggly, lice-ridden props and wigs so we just played around
with our own sunglasses.
(Rant: Why do these
photobooths always catch you off guard?! Like you’re ready and posing, but as
soon as you turn to say “I wonder when the pictures will start tak-“ SNAP! Greaatt,
got one of me mid talking, and it certainly doesn’t look like a cute ‘model in
the middle of a sentence’ pose.... Rant over.)
5.30pm- Shopping
Spree (well, attempted shopping spree!)
We decided to make the shopping centre our final stop before
heading back to London. But as we wandered through the cemtre, past the
half-closed shutters and tidy stores, we slowly began to realise that the shops
were all closing for the day! At SIX PM!!?? Whaattt?? This would never
happen in London we all gasped! Haha! We soon realised that there would be no
point actually going into any shops as we wouldn’t be able to look without
feeling rushed so we headed to the outdoor shops hoping they may open later.
We were correct, by half an hour! I trawled the rails of the
New Look sale and managed to find a
lot of bargains which I modelled for the girls who were ‘resting their legs’ on
the comfy changing room sofas. I decided to buy a white, long sleeve bardot top
(I only have cropped short ones at the moment but love the idea of wearing it
in summer!) and a Christmas jumper. I know, I am waayyy off, but it was so cute
I couldn’t resist! It is a super soft black jumper with two Christmas puddings
on the boobie sections! Alice wasn’t sure if I knew that the pudding placement
looked like boobies, so she tried to tactfully tell me. Little did she know, I
LOVED the boobie placement! Haha.
6.30pm- Home Time
After a little look through M&S as a time filler, we
slowly made our way back up to Brighton station. We were well and truly pooped
out! Lots of walking and lot’s of laughing led to three tired girls.
The hour and twenty minutes passed by as we watched the
sunset from the train window whilst reminiscing about our day and began
planning our next adventure! I think the word IKEA was tossed about which
sounds like so much fun! Stay tuned for that!
Has this post inspired you for a UK Daytrip? Let me known in the comments or via Twitter!
Eb x
