Well, David B is gone, but there's enough fab Indian restaurants and museums here in Manchester to keep me occupied. The hotel we're staying at, The Palace Hotel, is absolutely beautiful. It used to be a bank and insurance company, and the architecture and artistry is really impressive.
staircase to our room, look at the tile, it's all over the huge hotel!
the doors to the restaurant
Even though it's kind of old and drafty, I love old buildings like these. They just don't make buildings like these anymore and the attention to details, all the nooks and crannies, the archways and hand-carved banisters, these are the things I could stare at for hours, thinking about the things these walls have seen.
the foyer/front desk ceiling
Then we had to wash our stinky rags. A week and a half in and out of hotel rooms, it was bloody time! We took a cab and a stuffed suitcase to a launderette by Manchester U. Here the girls befriended a little sweetheart from Tibet. Her parents are in Manchester to study at the U. She followed the girls around and giggled constantly. Big sis carried her all over and little sis gave her a small draw-string bag she had in her backpack.
We went to a delicious Indian restaurant for dinner (third time here in the UK) and enjoyed our favorites.
and big sis likes to take pictures as much as her "mum" and took this.
self portrait...waiting for Dave to come back from a meeting, bored...
Bored then, well, we walked over to Chinatown our second night.
Stopped in at a Chinese herb store, bought some rash shower gel for little sis' rash on her tummy. Then I got a little 30 minute session of acupuncture, good to do a few times a year to sort of tune-up the body...back at the hotel enjoying my first Brandy Alexander, in appreciation of one of my favorite musicians, Fiest.
Third night , walked down to a town square area, listened to some musicians play. Stopped by the good ol' Urban Outfitters and perused the sale rack, and took some pictures of different people. Let me tell you, punk is alive and well in the UK, LOOOOOVE it!!! The Brits know a lot about fashion, I could sit and people watch all day! People aren't afraid to throw on a fake fur leopard jacket, sport a bad-ass mohawk, rat out that hair reminiscent of a 60's go-go dancer, or wear a skirt that in the States would be considered too short with fuchsia colored tights covering thighs that would be considered too big-awesome!!!!
(and my camera battery promptly died right after this shot, so bummed because I had thought how cool it would have been to do a post of cool UK trends)...sigh...
Manchester was really rainy the 3 days we were there, kind of a bummer. We saw a great Science museum and sat having coffee and tea quite a lot (of course, Indian one more time) and the girls talked on the phone with their pen pals who funny enough only live a short distance away, but ended up being really sick and couldn't make it to meet up with us (bummer, but we hope to be back to the UK next year).The girls have had these 2 sisters about the same age as each of my girls for pen pals for the last 2 years. They are also homeschoolers and are faithful at snail mail letters once or twice a month. They exchange hand-made or unique gifts for birthdays and Christmas, as well as small trinkets from trips or vacations. I think it's so cool the girls at least got to talk over the phone.
And some snuggle time in with little sis. I rather thing I look quite busty in these pics...
Well, off to Paris next!!
Au Revoir!
