At the weekend, Simon and I celebrated our 11 year wedding anniversary. For the past few years we have taken advantage of the offer of childcare from our parents to allow us to go away, just the two of us. For this anniversary we decided to visit Manchester for two nights.
We both like a good city break. We both like shopping, eating nice food and visiting nice bars, so we often opt for a City break if we get the chance.
We travelled up to Manchester on Friday after Simon had finished work. The traffic was pretty awful, so we were glad to finally arrive! We had chosen to stop at the Hilton Deansgate, due to it’s central location and the fact that we are also Hilton Honours members, so we generally get an upgrade and access to the Executive Lounge (free drinks anyone?!).
The hotel was lovely and we had a fantastic view of the city from our room. Once we’d checked in, we decided to try out Cloud 23, which is a popular cocktail bar situated on the 23rd floor of the Hilton hotel. The bar was lovely, but the drinks were very expensive – I think my cocktail was £12.50! It was a nice treat though.
The following day we enjoyed the great breakfast at the hotel and then headed to the shops for a spot of shopping. Manchester is fantastic for shopping – the Andale Centre has all the usual high street chains and there is also a Selfridges and Harvey Nichols. When we were all shopped out, we stopped for a cocktail at The Corn Exchange, which features a great mix of bars and restaurants. Whilst we were there we decided to have a late lunch at Gino D’Campo’s My Restaurant, which was delicious!
After heading back to the hotel to recharge our batteries, we got changed and went for a few drinks and nibbles in the hotel’s Executive Lounge, before heading to a Spinnyfields, which offers a selections of lovely bars and restaurants. After a few cocktails there, we decided that we were both quite tired and called it a night.
The following morning we checked out the hotel’s swimming pool/spa area, which although wasn’t huge, was adequate for what we needed and I spent half an hour reading a book. Before heading home to collect the children, who had been camping with Simon’s parents, we decided to check out the shops at The Trafford Centre, which again were fantastic.
We had a lovely weekend celebrating our anniversary. It was so nice being able to spend quality time together chatting, shopping, eating and drinking. Manchester was a great place to visit, great shops, bars and restaurants, all of which are quite centrally located. I’d definitely recommend a visit.
J x
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