pandop | Happy Holidays

Well I had a really nice week off, trouble is a week is just long enough to really get used to not coming to work.

London was fun, but exhausting and I got blisters from my new hiking boots - I do have the worst luck with shoes sometimes. It really reinforced that I need to get fitter, and especially to get walking fitter.
A couple of highlights were the canal cruise we took on the Regents Canal, and the actual building that houses the Natural History Museum, oh - and Spamalot of course. I rediscovered my love for Camden Lock Market, and my desire to have enough money to buy all the shiny pretty things there. Great food stalls too.
I could have lived without the rain on Sunday though, I do so love being soggy. Still, it gave us the excuse to go to a gerat pub.

The Thistle hotel we stayed in was really good, the staff were great, as was the food.

Camden Lock itself, from the inside:

A nice row of narrow boats on the Regent's Canal:

Some of the really cool interior design of the Natural History Museum:

Thorpe Park was fun, but would have been better if I could have walked without pain! I would also have liked it more if the place had been fully open, that so many of the concessions were closed gave the impression that opening that day was a half-hearted affair.
The rides were mostly good though. Colossus is a bit long, but Stealth is fantastic, much, much better than Oblivion at Alton Towers. Nemesis is Nemesis, and good, so we went on that a lot.

Even though

ninox had warned me about the Tussauds-istaion of Warwick Castle, and I had lowered my expectations accordingly, I was still very disappointed by it, and incredibly glad that we had not paid full price to get in. There were too many models and not enough history for my liking. The engine house was cool though - we really liked that.

It does at least manage to look castle-y though:

Nottingham was fun. The Tales of Robin Hood weren't as bad as I expected them to be (they could do with models that looked like actual people though) and Warhammer World was fantastic (note to Nottingham Tourist Information, Warhammer World is indeed a tourist attraction, so don't be so snotty when you are asked about it). There wasn't very much castle at Nottingham Castle any more, but the museum there was good. I really do want to go back to Nottingham and see more of the city, as we liked what we saw very much. More good pubs too!

A very blurry photo of the Peter Jackson Hobbit miniature at Warhammer World: