Norbreck Hotel - Blackpool

It took us a week to find the perfect hotel for our 2 week stay in Blackpool, and it was my husband Sean who found the Norbreck Castle Hotel. We got an awesome deal on a 2 week stay by going direct, we looked at loads of other hotel compare sites but none was as cheap as going onto the Britannia Hotel website.

I will be honest, it doesn't look great from the outside, when I first saw pictures of it on Google, it reminded me of a prison instead of a hotel but we got an awesome deal on our stay and I figured it could be worse haha.

We stayed for 2 weeks in October as we thought it would be a quieter time, we arrived on a Saturday and there was a signing convention so it was absolutely packed. They have a huge car park but it took us nearly 20 minutes to find a space to park in.

Checking in was fine, we got our room key quick quickly and was soon going up in the lift to find our room. Parts of the hotel are extensions on the original building so there are a lot of rooms, 487 to be precise.

I know we got a cheap deal on our room but I was a bit disappointed when we got to our room to find that it was big enough for a double bed, a wardrobe, a chest of drawers and about 2 feet to walk through on 3 sides of the bed. It was a very small room and what made it worse was when I looked out the window to see a wall 3 feet in front of me. I liked the bathroom though, it was a good size with a bath/shower, sink and toilet.

The bed was ok, we started to get back problems towards the end of the 2 weeks. The pillows were great though, we asked for extra and it was no problem getting them.

One thing you should know is that no matter how long you are staying in the hotel, your room won't get cleaned or bed changed unless you ask for it. We brought bin bags to change our bin ever few days and then gave the rubbish to a staff member who was cleaning the rooms.

At the beginning of our stay, Sean and I came down with a stomach bug. Sean was ill the day after we arrived and just after he started to feel better, I became ill. We thought that it was something we had eaten when we were out but found out that other guests had been ill as well.

As part of our deal, we also had a buffet breakfast included. They had a great selection from a fried breakfast, scrambled eggs, fried eggs, bacon, sausages, tomatoes, hash browns, baked beans, mushrooms and toast. Then there was fruit, yoghurts, cereals, different breads and fruit juices. We never had any issue with finding a table and no matter what time we went down for breakfast, there was always plenty of food.

You can also have a buffet dinner but you need to book that each day once breakfast has finished. The menu changes each day and it is put on a notice stand in the lobby. It was £12 each when we were there, which I thought was a good price seeing as we would have spent a lot more than that if we had gone out for dinner. There was also a great selection of food for dinner, usually something in a sauce with a potato product like chips or mash and then lots of different vegetables. We saw menus that had beef hot pot, chicken kiev, pasta bakes and Cumberland sausage in gravy. You also got dessert which was usually different cakes.

There is a big bar area where they put on nightly entertainment such as bingo, a quiz or cabaret. We had loads of fun going to the do the quiz and play bingo, during the week there wasn't a lot of people staying in the hotel so there wasn't loads of us but it was still lots of fun. If we won at bingo, we won money but if we won in the quiz, we won bottles of wine, so we were happy haha. The cabaret though, was not very good. The girl singer didn't sound check properly so she sounded terrible and even though my Sean tried to help (seeing as he is a musician so he knows how to sound check properly), she didn't want to hear what he had to say. One night there was a man singing with her and he was really good, but he didn't get to sing much.

There is a spa that has a gym, swimming pool, steam room, sauna and a jacuzzi. You can get a week pass for £5 as a hotel guest and it is so worth it, one days when the weather wasn't nice outside, we would have a day in the spa. We didn't use the gym, but we could see it through the windows and it looked really nice with lots of equipment.

If you do find yourself bored in the hotel, there is an arcade room with lots of games and a cinema that shows a few films a day.

Other than the big bar area, there is also a lounge and an adult only bar called Jack's but neither of them was open while we were staying in the hotel.

There is a tram stop on the opposite side of the road to the hotel which will have you on the main seafront in 20 minutes. The Blackpool Trams are also very regular and runs until late so you can go out having fun and not worry about getting back to the hotel. They go all the way down to Blackpool Pleasure Beach and all the way up to Fleetwood Market.

Soup N Tap - Eastbourne

I love this place, the vibe is happy, the food is delicious, the staff are amazing and they do pina coladas in a hollowed out pineapple......What more could you want?

Sean and I popped in here after seeing the sign about the pina coladas. We had had a day of shopping so needed somewhere to have a chill out and a drink.

The pina colada was so yummy! I think having it in the pine apple make a real difference, lots of extra pineapple. I love the fact that they put the pineapple in a little bowl so it doesn't fall over, I feel there may have been a few accidents in the past lol.

We loved it so much in there that I ended up having a bowl of soup as well. The soup was a lovely chicken soup that you could tell was home made, it was just so delicious and what made it better was that it was gluten free. They really look after people here making sure that only the best food is served.

Definitely worth a revisit next time I'm in Eastbourne.

EP Review - Black Dogs And Sad Men - Revenant

I love that all of Revenant's songs are relatable, you end up sitting there wondering if they somehow tapped into your head and wrote a song just for you. They write and sing from the heart making every song special in it's own way.

Lie You're Living

This song is mind blowing, it will have you toe tapping and head banging around the living room. I can't keep my bum still when listening to this tracker.

Black Dogs And Sad Men

There are some seriously awesome guitar parts in this song, and after hearing it live, I can confirm, they are face melting! I love the drums as well, they are hard hitting and have a real marching feel to them.

I'll Be There

I love this song, I asked the band about this song in our recent interview and Sam said that he started writing it because his wife had a friend who had some personal issues and the song was so that she knew they were there for her. It's a beautiful song and I feel like it could be used by anyone to let someone know they are there for them when they don't know how to put it into words themselves.

Sex With No Substance

OMG the guitars on this track are super sexy! This is the song that you NEED to hear live because it is the song that will have every part of you dancing around the room or standing like a rock star playing air guitar. Sing with me "she's sex! sex with no substance. She'll leave you begging for more!"

All We Need

I am not going to lie, this song does bring tears to my eye. You really need to listen to the lyrics. "Do you ever feel time pass you by and bring you to your knees. moments fly right by in the blink of an eye and it's time for us to leave." It make me think of people that I miss either by them passing away or because we just haven't had the time to see each other

Overall, this is a frigging awesome EP, the pure musical talent of these 4 guys is outstanding and they are only going all the way to the top.

Freemasons Arms - Snodland

The Freemasons Arms in Snodland is a seriously underrated pub. Everyone is super friendly, they have a lovely big outdoor area and the food is always delicious. I've never had a bad experience in this pub.

I've had a few different meals there now and each one has been really enjoyable. I particularly liked the lamb roast that I had on my last visit. Everything was cooked perfectly and well presented.

My husband's favourite meal is the steak pie because the plate is topped high with mash and the pie is filled with big chunks of meat. I don't think I have ever seen him finish everything on the plate.

My mum's favourite is the shepherds pie, unless we go in on a Sunday and then she will have the roast.

I do love that they are happy for adults to have the child's meals too, my mum finds adult portions too much for her so it was nice that she could have a child's roast.

The prices are really good as well, in a time when some restaurants and pubs are putting up their prices for food, the Freemasons prices are very agreeable and the food is well worth the price.

It can get very busy, especially on a Sunday so make sure you call up to book a table.

Medusa Live In London : The Motion Picture

What started off as an idea for a gig movie soon became a piece of art after several issues, setbacks and the band having to get seriously creative.

The original plan for the band, Medusa, was to do a gig on a boat and film it so that they could turn it into a gig movie. A excellent idea and they had every set up and ready to go, until the night before the gig. The sound engineer for the gig called and cancelled due to a medical emergency. This left the band hardly any time to find a new sound engineer that was available to work the gig, bring a full sound system onboard, as there wasn't one available on the boat and record the audio from the gig. This problem was quickly solved and everyone could get excited again about the gig.

The next morning, the band set everything up on the boat, fans started arriving, there was excitement in the air as everything looked like it was going to be a huge success. And then the band sat down to review the footage from the 4 cinema cameras they had used and found that 2 of the camera operators had overexposed the footage so much that the footage was almost completely white making it unusable.

To make up for the missing footage, the band organised a second gig at a disused nuclear bunker in London. They invited their fans to go along to the gig with the promise of free beer and being filmed as members of the audience, forever making them part of the film.

Unfortunately, that still didn’t give them all the footage they needed, so they set up a third gig at the legendary Dublin Castle in Camden. Everything was going great until it turned out that there was a double booking at the venue and everyone got kicked out before the end of the gig.

They were running out of options to get footage, so they decided on a completely different approach by buying and customising a puppet to look exactly like Julian. It even had a replica of his outfit and his guitar from the boat gig.

What they thought would be simple process turned out to be the most demanding part of the entire process. For over six months, a small team helped Julian painstakingly modify the puppet for each scene an frame. The moving puppet scenes ended up being just as time-consuming as all the gig shoots combined, but it worked and was a brilliant addition to the film.

The film also has a cartoon sequence of the band members causing chaos around London on the morning of the original gig on the boat and photos of places specific to the band's history.

Although it was a lot of extra hard work, I feel that each element in the film are what make it so interesting and enjoyable to watch. You can see the effort that everyone went to in order to make something that no one had ever done before.

I'm not surprised that the film has had a lot of interest from the BFI and Sky Arts and I really I hope it's popularity continues to grow.