Chester Weekend

Sat, 24 May 2025 18:49:31 GMT

Last weekend, the stars aligned a little bit - trans gym was cancelled because our trainer was doing the Great Manchester Run with their kid, and I realised it was the last weekend before school half term takes us into June, both of which make going anywhere more expenses. So I did some shopping around and found a place to stay in Chester on Vrbo for me, E and V. We'd been talking about going away just the three of us since Gary died, but this is the first time we actually managed it between other commitments, lack of spoons etc.

The place was just a terraced house in Hoole, outside the city centre. It clearly once housed chronic smokers, because all the modern renovations hadn't quite rid it of the stale smoke smell. It wasn't a problem for us at least. We settled down with Korean burgers takeout and had a fairly early night.

On Saturday we went into Chester for lunch. Chester has two car parks which are only for Blue Badge holders, one of them right behind the Cathedral, so I parked up there. The weather was glorious. V was in their powerchair, and we pottered around a bit, finding some cute tchotchkes at an indoor market and exploring the multi-layered city centre. Outside the town hall, we found Ed Alleyne-Johnson of New Model Army busking. It was great to hear him play! We found a nice restaurant, Cosy Club, with outside seating. The food was great, our waiter was a lovely ebullient twink, and we saw many good dogs. Afterwards we had a proper explore of Chester Cathedral, investigating the artwork and the exhibitions and the architecture. On Saturday night we watched the last episode of The Residence, a White House comedy murder mystery which we've been enjoying together, with Greek takeout.

Sadly on Sunday morning V wasn't feeling well enough for Chester Zoo, so instead we headed home slowly via the back roads, stopping near Lymm to admire a canal. We went to a Cheadle garden centre for a nice lunch and several plants for the garden.

Still, it was a lovely weekend. Very tiring but so nice to get away.

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Yorvik! Again!

Thu, 15 Feb 2024 22:43:50 GMT

I'm heading to York this weekend for the Yorvik Viking Festival with mother_bones, having gone there last year with cosmolinguist who will be holding down the fort and looking after Gary.

This year we've got tickets for the festival finale which promises to be great. In a pleasing coincidence, the guy behind Edwyrdian Tales is one of the cast, playing Loki. I'm used to listening to him narrate horror stories so it'll be good to see him in this.

I'm not making many plans because a lot of things will depend on MB's energy levels. We're staying in a hotel looking out over Clifford Tower, about 100 metres from the finale event. Even if MB can't make it out of the hotel we can probably see a bunch of it from the window! We'll also try to watch the March to Coppergate.

It's been a while since I've been away just with MB, and I'm looking forward to it!

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You Don't Live Like I Do

Chester Weekend

Yorvik! Again!