Sheffield, Blackpool and the O2!

Back in September after Andy won the US Open I decided that I had better get a move on and decide if we were going to see some tennis at the O2 this year.

A quick twitter conversation followed and Jennifer and I decided that we would go....and Rob reluctantly decided to accompany us.

There was no way of knowing who would be playing in which session and so we decided to go for the first session on the Monday....hoping that they would start off with the Olympic and US Open Champion....!

We decided to make a weekend of it and I thought it might be nice to see the Blackpool Illuminations.

So, Rob and I headed up to Sheffield on the Friday afternoon - this took us a little longer than planned as it was the end of the half term break and so the roads were quite busy :(

We stayed overnight at a Premier Inn and then picked up Jennifer in the morning to head across to Blackpool.

The journey to Blackpool was uneventful and we arrived at our hotel around lunchtime.

The hotel only had four parking spaces and when we arrived there were none available so we parked a little way down the road and went to find out when we could check in.

Whilst we were there a space became free and so Rob ran off to get the car whilst Jennifer and I kept the space...!

A horrible man tried to run us over and take the space but I stood my ground and Rob arrived with the car to park up....yay!

We decided to take a walk along the promenade - the sea was quite wild and there was a lot of water coming across the sea wall :)

We had a walk around the high street and got some lunch in a place called 'toast'.

Back to the hotel to check in and get ready for the cold night to see the illuminations.

We decided to do a combination of walking and 'traming' as it was so cold.

Unfortunately, the illuminations were a bit disappointing....I don't know what I expected but it was more than this!



We did have a nice dinner at Bella Italia but I'm not sure that it was worth the trip to Blackpool :(

We then had a terrible night in our hotel (so many issues I won't bother listing them) and collectively we decided to get out of there as soon as possible.

We had breakfast and then promptly left on our journey to London!

It was wet and miserable for the drive to London - as forecast I might add. We stopped once to grab lunch and then carried on our way.

We had a few sat nav issues in London but eventually found our hotel quite easily.

Our original plan for the evening had been to go and watch a firework display but we changed our minds and decided to head to the O2 to get some dinner and maybe watch the new Bond movie.

We went to the nearest tube station and the American had to explain to us how to get us an Oyster card......!

Cards bought and we were on our way :)

We had a little wander around the O2 and decided to eat at Zizzi. We had a nice meal and then went to see the 7.20 showing of Skyfall.

I am not a fan of Bond and had a few issues with the movie - in terms of believability......but it wasn't the worst Bond film that I have watched so that was good :)

Movie over and we headed back to the hotel for a good night's sleep......and tomorrow we would be seeing some guy called Murray play some tennis!

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