Friday 24 July 2015

Roadtrip Part 3 - Luxury, Longleat, Lashings of Butterbeer

It's another big'un. But you can never have enough cups of tea in one day, right?

With the prospect of rain for 4 days straight we decided to quit the camping, pack up the very soggy tent, and head to a hotel for some serious hair washing (that would be for me) and sleep in a room that didn't move with the weather. Staying in Cornwall, we booked a basic room and headed to Truro. It did exactly what it said on the tin and I slept for 12 hours straight. Feeling refreshed we started one of the longest legs of the journey, out of Cornwall and back to civilisation.

It took us 10 hours to travel 100 metres...ha! Not really, we got caught in one bit where there was road works but good music and some pear drop sweeties soon solved that.

We decided to stop for a coffee at the services at Exeter on the M5. NEVER EVER DO THIS! Yowser! We went from hardly any people to all the people in the entire world, or that was what it felt like, all queuing up for Burger King. Horrid. I'm still mentally scarred by the experience.

Thankfully that horror was to be replaced by one of sheer relaxation when we reached our hotel for the night. It was intended to be our first hotel from camping so we planned a bit of luxury, spoiling ourselves, and oh-ho we were not let down. The 3 Daggers was absolutely ah-mazing! I've planned another blog post about it as it was such a brilliant place to stay so look out for that soon.

The reason for our Wiltshire accommodation was to go to Longleat. I was sooo looking forward to this as had always wanted to go so was properly excited. After we'd been there about 2 hours I was filled with a kind of dread, is this all there is to see type feeling? If you do go, don't worry, once you've moved past the smaller attractions the safari drive is well worth the wait. The place was packed so Dave suggested we go over lunchtime when everyone else would be eating. Brilliant idea as it was really quiet. Essentially you get to drive around and the animals roam around you. Quite an amazing concept and also pretty brilliant! We saw so many cool animals and even though the road is probably only about a mile long, it took us 2 full hours to drive round it all.








As the last of the crowds started to fade away we wandered around the other attractions, the best one being the maze of mirrors! So much fun!



We might have ended the day with another ice cream... And yes, we're on a healthy eating thing now!

And so to Watford. Say what? Not exactly the most sexy sounding place. You would be right there, but very conveniently located for HARRY POTTER WORLD! (not the real name at all but it sums it up pretty well). It was our last day. I was big style looking forward to this but also kind of nervous as Dave knows absolutely nothing about Potter and has no interest in it either.

That's a guy right there who will indulge your likes even if they're not his likes, just sayin'.

We arrived. The queues were enormous. But it was worth it. I'm really not going to say too much as if you plan to go (and who wouldn't) I would hate to ruin the many brilliant surprises that are there to greet you. All I will say is that it was absolutely, 100% a 5 star attraction, for all ages. If you love Potter you will gasp out loud and be open jaw delighted by so many things, and even if you don't love Potter (like Dave) you will LOVE it! Yes that is the real steam train. And the real Knight Bus. I say no more.



And so our road trip came to an end. A brilliantly good end. It was proper fabulous and a truly great holiday. I think they call them a Stay-Cation these days but I just call it a bloody good time!  

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