COMEDY: Katherine Ryan (Loughborough)

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TATTOO: Lewis Point (Daventry)

For many years Rose has been wanting to get her Helloween pumpkin tattoo either covered up or removed. Years ago we visited a tattooist who was very skeptical about covering it up and then Rose investigated the removal process. That proved an expensive and inconclusive dead end, so once again the idea of a cover up raised it's head.

When we went to the tattoo convention we made a bee-line for Lewis Point tattoo's and spoke to Chris about covering the pumpkin with the Nightwish 'Once' angel, and his attitude was totally different. He said it was no problem at all, and so it proved. Cora did a great job as you can see from the photo's below. 

HOLIDAY: Lincoln

Rose and I are pretty sure that we've been to Lincoln before, and indeed I did see one small part of it that I recognised from before. What I think happened though, was that we came and parked at the bottom end, looked around the shopping centres and the not so nice bits, but didn't venture up to the old parts and the cathedral or castle. Which is where you want to be to be brutally honest!

We stayed at the very lovely Doubletree by Hilton and were very happy to receive our complimentary Doubletree cookies on arrival (delicious!). We turned up early with a view to parking and checking in later, but even though we were three hours early we were allowed to go up to our room anyway - result!

The room was very nice (as always with Doubletree) and thankfully didn't suffer from being unbearably hot (like the one in Chester). We unpacked and then headed off into the better parts of the town that we hadn't seen on our previous visit. One thing everybody tells you about Lincoln is the aptly named 'Steep Hill', it cannot be denied that it is very steep indeed!

Still we made it to the top, stopping off to look in a few shops along the way, and then visited the cathedral. We were in there for quite a while, maybe an hour and a half I should think...

There was nothing particularly exceptional about the cathedral, it was very cathedrally... but it was a nice place to visit. It did seem very short on plaques and statues, but the stonework and vaulted ceilings were as impressive as you would expect. On the way down the hill we found Bunty's tea room, supposedly the best tea room in Lincoln, and it didn't disappoint.

We both had a lovely bacon sandwich, with crisps and coleslaw on the side, followed by cake. Rose had white chocolate and raspberry and I had carrot cake. My carrot cake didn't really taste as I expected, but it was very nice. It wasn't as sweet as I anticipated, and it was more 'datey' and dark tasting, very much richer than I expected too. I had a taste of Rose's cake and that was very nice too, pretty substantial chunks of cake they were too!

After our late lunch we headed back down the hill towards the hotel, we were a bit undecided about where to have our dinner that night, but we had seen a restaurant around the corner called 'Lincolnshire Red' that looked promising. We looked around a few shops and then went for a drink at Prezzo, sitting outside in the warm afternoon by the quayside.

We had a couple of drinks there before heading back to the hotel and chilling a bit, then showering and getting ready for dinner. Once back in the room we looked at the menu for the hotel restaurant and decided it looked pretty promising. We did a little checking on trip advisor and discovered it was very well rated, unlike Lincolnshire Red which was either brilliant or terrible depending on who you believed... and decided to stay on site for the evening.

The Electric Restaurant was a lovely place to eat, we were sat by the window so we could enjoy the views as we enjoyed our meal. Having stuffed ourselves on cake in Bunty's, a pudding was never really on the cards, which was just as well as we didn't really fancy any of them, but we did enjoy our steaks and thrice cooked chips and the gorgeous bread rolls we were given. One of them was just a nice bread roll, but the other one was called charcoal cheese bread. It was a very dark grey colour, but actually just tasted like a very nice, slightly cheesy bread roll. Nice!

After dinner, we adjourned next door to the very stylish penthouse cocktail bar. We started off with a Long Island Iced Tea (not on the menu, but hey, why not), which was very nice. Then Rose switched to wine and I had a gorgeous non-alcoholic strawberry and orange cocktail, and finally Rose had the fruity cocktail I had just had with Vodka in it and I had Pina Colada-ish cocktail which came complete with a 'naked' marshmallow (properly attired marshmallows are so passe, darling)! 

By this time we had moved from the centre of the bar to the tables at the back of the picture above. It wasn't the easiest thing in the world to get up there. but once there it was very comfortable. We called it a night just after midnight, I was starting to feel a bit drunk to be honest, and we headed up to our room.

One other thing about the bar we really liked was the lamps on the tables, these came from Insight Cordless Lighting and we intend to buy a couple of the lamps shown below.

The next morning we had a lovely breakfast, including some delicious, full sized croissants, before heading out to Debenhams, before circling back just in time to catch the boat trip at 11am.

The boat trip itself was pleasant enough, although it might have been just as nice to walk up the path alongside the canal and back. The on-board commentary though was tedious beyond belief. Running desperately short of things to talk about (for a city so steeped in history) we were told about everything from which supermarkets were in the town to how to go about securing a fishing license.

It got a bit hot on the top deck, so on the way back we moved downstairs and met the boat's dog, sleeping in his basket. Meanwhile Captain Jackie sat in her little cubby-hole, where she thought no one could see her scoffing Ginsters sausage rolls...

Being not so slim myself, it may be a case of not throwing stones in glass houses, but I have never seen so many epically fat women as in Lincoln. It really was quite extraordinary the number that waddled past Prezzo's while we were there, it was like a chubby-chasers paradise or something.

Alighting from the Brayford Belle, we decided to have lunch before leaving for home, and inevitably we ended up back at Bunty's (up that bloody steep hill again) this time enjoying egg mayo and bacon sandwiches, but no cake. We just weren't hungry enough, not even one piece between us.

We would both go back to Lincoln, and stay at the Doubletree again. It was really nice to be able to stay on site, eat and drink and then just go down in the lift to bed. It really was quite excellent!

MEAL OUT: Olde Coach House (Ashby St Ledgers)

T'was the first day of our holiday, and Rose had to visit Daventry to talk to her tattooist Cora ahead of her appointment on Wednesday morning. So we decided we would go out for dinner on the way back and selected The Olde Coach House in Ashby St Ledgers. 

It was nicely laid out with lots of little rooms, making it a characterful place to visit. The staff were very good and the food was slightly above average, albeit not in the 'Grey Goose' league. Rose had a gourmet burger (which was very nice) and I had a slice of pie, which was okay. Chips were a bit pale but fine.

Neither of us could manage a pudding, especially as we had brownies at home, so we passed (the prices were a bit steep as well to be honest). I can't imagine rushing back, especially as it's a fair drive from our house, but it was pleasant enough. 

Apparently, it's been recently refurbished, though it didn't really look like it and it was somewhat let down by the very small and unappealing toilets.

TATTOO CONVENTION (Northampton)

This was our first visit to a tattoo convention, held in the grounds of Northampton Rugby Club. There were a fair few exhibitors in attendance, who's talent ranged from the sublime to the not very good actually. One surprise was seeing on the wall a photograph of a Laurie Lipton tattoo, not necessarily the one above, but the same picture.

http://www.alternativearttattoo.com/galleries/ben-labrum/

Also performing was the Circus of Horrors, who we saw several years ago at DeMontfort Hall. Performing without a band and with a limited cast in a small room, it was okay but you'd have to say that it worked so much better as a full production. 

Still it was worth seeing, and it was quite interesting to see people actually being tattooed. I still don't really get exactly how it works though. One reason for attending was so that Rose could talk to the man from Daventry about a cover up and he seemed to think that it would be no problem at all.