Christmas 2025

Christmas Day

Christmas 2025... I went on a 4.95 mile walk in the morning on my own since the gym was shut so had to get my steps in and some fresh air. Got back and got ready to go to nanny Wing's for lunch.

Nanny Wing with Max the youngest great grand child

Annual cousin photo

Billy having a tantrum cos he hates photos

Not the biggest spread of food - turkey and belly pork were the meat then carrots, parsnips, sprouts and roast potatoes and the obligatory Chinese soup

Lunch was at 2pm and was back home by 6pm as Tracy was going to her sister in laws then uncle Mike was going to his sister in laws. We just came home but I was ready to go to sleep when we got back. Managed to stay up to watch the 2 parts of Eastenders - just about though as part 2 was on at 9:45pm. Quite an uneventful Christmas day but was nice to see everyone and be back in grandma's.

Saturday 27th December

Went out with Danielle, Kelly and David. I picked David up from his mum's as he was home from London and Kelly up from Lime Street as she was coming from Manchester and we went to Penny Lane. We went to The Dog House and had a few drinks there then went for food in Croccante. Me, Danielle and Kelly shared.

Ortolana - Tomato sauce, mozzarella, courgette, aubergine, sun-dried tomato with added chicken - £13.50 + £2 for extra chicken

Amatriciana - Tomato sauce, mozzarella, crispy pancetta, onion and pecorino - £14.50

We also got Fries with cheddar & crispy pancetta and Frittelline di Pizza with Croccante dip - Light, golden bites of fried pizza dough with our signature home made dip.

The fried pizza dough bites just chunks of pizza dough and they were very salty. I'd forgot to take a photo as the pizzas came before them and I'd started eating the pizza. The pizza is very thin and it's more of a take out place so all the cutlery and plates were disposable so was really hard to eat as I like to use a knife and fork to eat my pizza. (I hate getting my hands dirty!)

After food we went to the Richmond Tavern for 1 drink then I did my taxi round and dropped Kelly off at South Parkway and David back home.

Sunday 28 December

Yesterday I went to see Avatar 3 - Fire and Ash with Holly at Odeon Switch Island as she had free tickets and I've not seen her since we went to see Bastille over a month ago. The film was good but long - 3hrs and 17m! I didn't really know what was going on as I don't remember the first one and the last one came out 2 years ago and we went to see it on New Years Day when I was very tired in 3D. Definitely need to watch them all again but they're just too long to watch and because they're so visual you also have to watch them in the cinema. Just isn't the same watching them at home on your TV.

Monday 29 December

Was back in the office today but only till 3pm and not back working till Friday at home.

 After I went to Escape Hunt again to do an escape room with Jo, Rich and Jacob. We did The Last Vikings. It was really hard. We really struggled with this one but our time was faster than last year and broke out in 44 mins 35 secs which was a surprise. We thought it was about 50 minutes and was only 6 minutes off from getting on the leader board. Definitely the hardest one so far out of the 3 others I've done. Only one more I need to try which is the Wild West one.

After we went for dinner in Bakchich which is a Lebanese and Moroccan Restaurant on Bold Street. Not somewhere I would go but they had been before and said it was nice. The restaurant is quite small and when we turned up they didn't have a table for us so we had to wait about 15-20 minutes.

Matcha Latte with Coconut Milk - £4.80

Wasn't great and didn't taste like it was coconut milk

Mixed Shawarmas Platter - £14

Chicken and lamb with salad and Arabic rice

Shish Taouk - Chicken skewer, marinate in Lebanese spices - £19

Chicken Shawarmas Wrap - Salad, pickles, fries, garlic sauce, pomegranate molasses - £8

Chicken Shawarmas Saj Platter - £13

Jo also got the hummus starter and Rich the lentil soup. Jacob had his own skewers and the rest we shared. The lamb was good, the chicken was dry in the mixed platter. The wraps in the saj platter were crispy where as the normal chicken wrap was just a toasted wrap. The food was very garlicy and I was really thirsty when I came home. It's pretty similar to the Turkish grills as the flavours are similar and is with either rice or chips. Not my usual go to so nice to try something different. Dinner was my Christmas present off Jo and Rich and the escape room was mine to them.

Thanks again for dinner!

Off to see Zootroplis 2 tomorrow afternoon and either a New Years Eve party or chilled one in. Didn't originally have plans for every day after Christmas but managed to see nearly everyone and making the most of the time off work.

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Belfast

I went to Belfast last Friday for 1 night. I flew with Danielle on Friday morning at 7am from Liverpool.

It was such a strange flight as it's so short. We took off, they asked if anyone wanted any drink or food - didn't even bother with the trolley and then it was time to land. We landed at 7:33am and it was still dark. It was also strange how we didn't get ID'd. They just scanned our boarding passes and didn't check our name against anything. We had our passports but didn't even need them.

Getting out the airport was like walking out of Liverpool airport - it looks very similar. We got the 300a bus to the city centre - Grand Central Station. We got the 1 month return for £13.50 as it was cheaper than getting 2 singles (£9 each). It took 40 minutes. We walked to the hotel which was less than a 10 minute walk from the station. Our room wasn't ready yet so left out bags and went to a coffee shop while we waited for Kelly as she was flying on her own from Manchester and wasn't landing till 10:30am. 

We went to Nine Squared which was round the corner from the hotel. I got a Matcha Latte with coconut milk. Danielle got a Chai Latte and a pastry - custard, hazelnut, jam and cinnamon. It was nice but a bit dry.

It was a nice cafe and we stayed there for a few hours until Kelly arrived. Once Kelly was walking to the hotel from the bus station we walked back to the hotel.

 Our room we had booked wasn't ready yet but another room that was the same was ready so we took that one. The original room we had booked was in the loft.

Danielle had yer own bunk - she's always wanted a bunk bed so was made up.

It was a nice room and spacious.

After putting our bags down we walked to get some lunch.

We went to this ramen place - Ragin' Ramen.

Danielle got the Christmas special

Turkey Tantanmen - Sage tare roast turkey mince, maple miso charred sprouts, spring onion, cranberry chilli oil, 5 spice stuffing crumb, Tonkotsu broth - £16

Me and Kelly got the same

Raijin - Char-siu chashu flamed pork belly, pork bone Tonkotsu broth, house tare, spring onion, daikon, half Aijitama egg, nori - £16

I got mine with udon noodles and Kelly got rice noodles

It was nice but I was really hungry and this was not filling. I inhaled it.

I got the 2 courses for - £23 as I seen Matcha Tiramisu

It was Not a tiramisu... It was basically just a Victoria sponge cake with a load of matcha sprinkled on top. There was that much dry matcha powder that I was choking on it. It was like doing the cinnamon challenge! Was very disappointed.

After lunch we walked to City Hall as there was a free walking tour at 2:30pm. We didn't see anyone so went to the tourist info and they said look out for someone with a yellow umbrella but we couldn't see any. We didn't book on so guess they weren't running it so we ended up going on the hop on hop off double decker bus.

There was men promoting the buses and he could see we were googling online to see how much it was on there if it was cheaper and he let us on as students so paid £18 which lasts for 24 hrs which meant we could use it the next day when we go to the Titanic museum.

There was like 6 other people on the bus with us and they chose to sit right at the front where they were was shelter. We were the only ones to sit in the exposed but which wasn't the best idea as it was windy and got cold. We should have went downstairs and kept warm when we were stuck in traffic (I'm not sick with a cold and cough writing this post!)

Kelly and Danielle got a mulled wine for before we started the ride.

Belfast's answer to the Leaning Tower of Pisa - the leaning clock tower.

Titanic museum

Queen's University

Europa Hotel - the most bombed hotel in the world - 28x also where Bill and Hilary Clinton stayed

We ended up on the bus for an hour and 45 minutes as we were stuck in rush hour traffic for ages. We were just stuck at this junction for about 30 minutes. It was really interesting on the bus as it took is down to where the troubles were with the wall is with the divide and learnt quite a bit that I had no idea about. 

After the tour we went to a pub.

We went to the Duke of York pub. It was super busy and we couldn't find anywhere to sit so had to stand.

We went to another pub after but it was just a standard dark pub. Can't remember what it was called and no nice photos of it to show!

After we went for dinner. Kelly booked Nova an Italian restaurant which we had booked for 7:30pm.

I got

Ravioli Carbonara - Guanciale, black pepper, egg yolk, gran padano - £17.50

It was good portion size for ravioli as you usually get hardly any but it was very al dente and the panchetta was very salty.

Danielle got

Prawn Tagliolini - Portavogie prawn, bisque, confit tomatoes, chilli oil, chilli flakes, chives - £19.50

This was spicy as it has a lot of chilli in it.

Kelly got

Conchiglie - Vodka sauce, 'ndjuja, stracciatelle, chilli oil, chives - £16.50

This was even spicer. Kelly struggled to eat it it was that spicy!

Kelly and Danielle got to share

Hot Honey Bread - Nduja butter, toasted chilli flakes, cheese, hot honey - £7

As my food was really salty I was craving an ice cream and got a mischief McFlurry. One of the Christmas special ones. Comes with strawberry sauce, smarties and was meant to have sugar Christmas trees but didn't - £2.69

We went to the Christmas markets and Danielle got churros just with sugar - £6 for 6.

After we went to a pub not far from the hotel for 1 drink then headed back to the hotel. It had been a long day.

We didn't get up till 9:30am the next morning. We had Harlem Cafe booked for 11am which was by the hotel. It was super busy and there was was a massive queue even though we had a table booked. We didn't get seated till 11:15am.

Kelly and Danielle both got 

Harlem's All Day Irish Breakfast - Smoked bacon, butcher sausage, free range fried egg, black pudding, potato bread, soda bread, mushrooms and baked beans - £15.50

I got

Toasted sourdough with smoked salmon and poached eggs - £12.95

It was nice. Danielle said she likes it deconstructed but think I prefer it already done for me. So the salmon and egg on the break already.

After breakfast we jumped on the hop on hop off bus to the Titanic Museum. We were booked for 1:20pm and were there before 1pm but couldn't let us in early as they're in slots.

The dark tiles are the countries and the white line shows the route the titanic took from Belfast > Southampton > then on the way to New York.

The grass patches showing the amount of casualties. The furthest 3rd class, then 2nd class, then 1st class and the closest the crew. All the stuff outside the building, the actual building the completion and open all have a reason. The building is on the shipyard where the ship was built, it's the same height as the ship. The museum was opened on 31/03/2012 which marked the anniversary of the ships maiden voyage. 

It was really interesting and learnt a lot. Considering everything I knew about the ship was from the film which wasn't even based on real people wasn't the best source I had. Feel like I need to watch the the film again as I watched it when I was a kid but just don't have 3 hours of my life to spare!

We were in the museum for over 2 hours. There's a lot to see in there. Your ticket also lets you into SS Normadic. It is the last remaining ship of the White Star Line which built the Titanic. Inside has been done up though and is nothing like what it would have been like. Guess it would have been hard to maintain it.

After we walked back into the centre. Tried to go to a pub but they were all full and busy.

We went to the Christmas markets and that was mad busy. Ended up going back to the hotel. Kelly and Danielle got a drink there and I went to Orto and got a pizza before the flight home.

£16

Pizza was nice - was the cranberry sauce could have been spread out better rather than just put on randomly. I ate it all myself and was very full after.

We walked to the bus station and got the 6:30pm bus to the airport. It took ages and we didn't get to the airport till 7:24pm. Luckily the airport was dead and we went straight through security. Kelly and Danielle managed to get a sandwich. Went to the toilet then me and Danielle we were boarding at 7:55pm. Our flight was at 8:30pm and it took off at 8:23pm and landed back in Liverpool at 8:58pm. We spent more time on the bus than we did at the airport. We also landed before Kelly's flight even took off. Her flight was at 9:05pm.

It was a nice and short sweet trip to Belfast. You could definitely do it in a day. 7am flight there and the 8:30pm flight back - would be tiring but doable. It was mad not needing your passport, just spending the same money and not needed any travel adaptors!

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