The plan of course was simple, leave work at 2:30pm, get home at 3:15pm and leave at 3:45pm. And, indeed this part of the plan went very smoothly. But the traffic and roadwork chaos of Friday night in Manchester meant we didn't arrive at the Trafford Centre Premier Inn until nearly four hours later.
We stayed here before in 2014 and were very impressed, and a second visit didn't disappoint either. For the ridiculous price of £35, we had a great room with everything you could need and a very comfortable bed (so comfortable in fact we are seriously thinking about ordering one of their mattresses).
So we didn't hang about at the hotel for long and were soon off into the streets of Manchester, relying heavily on a badly lagging sat-nav to find the Ruby Lounge and the nearby NCP. This turned into an absolute nightmare, since every road we wanted to go on seemed to be closed, dug up, a bus lane or otherwise inaccessible. Not to mention having to contend with the moronic 'Deliveroo' bicycle riders. I'm sorry but seeing the way they conduct themselves I have no sympathy for them if they get knocked over, frankly they deserve it!
We weaved our way, aimlessly through the city, until we came to a car park, which may or may not have been somewhere near where we wanted to be, but seemed to be quite a long way away. We reversed back out of that one and tried another postcode, which took us back into the mayhem of Central Manchester. Finally we gave up and parked in the street, unsure of whether we needed to buy a ticket or not, or whether a ticket was available or if it would be any good even if we bought it???
As luck would have it (and it really was luck, make no mistake) we were parked about five minutes walk from 'The Ruby Lounge' where we witnessed a monumental show from Faderhead (see separate review HERE).
After the show we fired up the sat-nav once again and were immediately directed into a closed road. Fortunately the pre-show stress levels were now somewhat abated, and having laughed our way through most of Faderhead's show we were now willing to laugh at anything the sat-nav could throw at us, even when it directed us onto what must be the steepest and sharpest dropping COBBLED street in Northern England. We chortled our way to the bottom of the hill as the poor Corsa chattered and thumped it's ill-prepared descent, and then finally, somehow we were back on the road to the hotel.
Once there we had a midnight snack in the room (the balance of the baguettes we had brought from home - still lovely and fresh, surprisingly) and then headed to the bar. On enquiring of the barmen what wines he had available, rather than throwing a few names about , he dramatically flung the wine fridge door open, waved his hand at it and then disappeared from view. Of course by this time we found this utterly hilarious, and after a couple of drinks we headed to bed around 2am.
After a (rather cold) breakfast, we headed out of the hotel and over the road to the Trafford Centre. It seemed to take several hours to walk from the car to the shops, but was probably less than that. The plan was to spend a few hours in this place, then leave at 4pm to get to Oxford Street, grab a bite at the Wetherspoons and then hit the Ritz for Millencolin at 8pm.
The first part of all this went largely to plan, and we did indeed leave at about the designated time. But not before some less than satisfactory shopping. For some reason the Trafford Centre seems like an inferior version of Meadowhall, with most of the shops being smaller than you might expect.
One positive was that I noticed an Ernest Jones and walked in to see whether the fabled 'TAG Heuer Carrera 01' was actually available to buy yet.
As soon as we walked in the door (in hoodies and combats/jeans) a man welcomed me and asked me if I was looking for something for Valentine's Day. I told him the true purpose of our visit and we were whisked off immediately and seated, ready for the unveiling of the watch of awesomeness. Sensing a big sale our man offered us tea, coffee, champagne... but we were having none of that, we just wanted to see the watch thanks very much, and then we would be on our way, credit card intact.
My major concern was that the watch was going to be too big for my wrist given the bezel size, but it looked perfect on my wrist and the case and strap in particular looked fantastic and very cool. The face itself is quite busy, but again very cool and when you turn it over it has a glass back to display TAG's first proper 'in house' movement. I would love to have bought it there and then, but at £4,300 it requires a cool head (and besides I know it's available elsewhere for £3550 (a whopping £750 less).
Make no mistake though, this is a very cool watch and I have every intention of adding it to my collection. A.S.A.P.
After this we wandered around the Trafford Centre for quite a while, buying a lamp in John Lewis and some chocolates in Hotel Chocolat, but generally remaining less than impressed with the whole place. About 4pm we headed off to the city again, and found Chester St, then Oxford Street relatively easily.
I suppose we should have guessed Wetherspoons would be packed, but somewhat optimistically we hoped we would find a table immediately. Of course it was rammed so we headed off down the street in search of elusive pubs and places to eat. After a lot of fruitless searching we found a pub / bowling alley / restaurant called 'All Star Lanes'. Basically it was the best of a poor selection and when we sat down it appeared we had stumbled into a kids birthday party. Fortunately the level of kids dissipated fairly quickly and we had a reasonably okay meal in their, though we discovered to our cost just how peppery and hot Chipotle Mayo is...
We walked back up the freezing cold street to the Wetherspoons and managed to bag a table for an hour, biding our time before the Millencolin show. Millencolin were okay (see review HERE) but couldn't begin to live with Faderhead the night before and after an early finish (yes) we were on our way home before ten and walked in our front door on the stroke of midnight. Stupidly though, we then stayed up until 3am, for no good reason. IDIOTS!
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