*Cardiff Girly Weekend Trippy ~ 26th/28th September '08*

[mandymouse]

Friday 26th September

Finally the day had arrived. After months of looking forward to meeting the DIS Girlies again after a great weekend in Birmingham last October, it was now time for a weekend of eating, drinking and shopping (what more could we want ?)

At 10am, Natalie and I were waiting for my hubby to come home and drop us over at New Street Station in Birmingham. We finally left around 10.15am and arrived at the station about ½ an hour later. As we were a bit early for the train, we decided to pop to the pub for a quick drink. Sadly it was too early for a drinkypoo for Nat so I had a cup of tea and a cheese roll and Nat had a coffee and muffin. Our train was leaving at 11.30am, so we headed down to the platform and thankfully our train left on time

The train journey went by very quickly, and an hour later we were joined by Deb in Gloucester. We arrived in Cardiff at 1.30pm, and as we met up with Sue (who was driving us to the hotel) we were then joined by Joh

Sue had had a charity event at work that morning, and as she opened her car, she handed out beer glass money banks and erm blow up husbands to us (and as you may know, one of them went on to be known as ‘Derek’ ). Somehow, Sue managed to fit all of us and a few rather large suitcases into her car and we headed to the hotel.

As my room was under Kaylee’s name, and I didn’t have a credit card with me, I couldn’t check-in, so I bunked down in Nat and Joh’s room till Kaylee arrived. Once Deb had dropped her case off in her room, she joined us in Nat & Joh’s room and within moments the wine and Bacardi Breezers were flowing (except for Deb’s, as she had frozen her wine to keep it cold, so her’s trickled out and looked like slush )

We had a great hour or so chatting and drinking, then Sue went off to pick Kaylee and Tammy up from the station. Once Kaylee had checked in, we went off to our room (which we ended up changing as it didn’t have the two big beds in it), emptied our cases, and then went back to the party in the girls room

After a while, we all left to get changed and we all met in reception at 6.30pm, where we met up with Claire and Theresa who had driven up and checked in a little earlier. We took some photos and then walked to Cardiff Bay as we had a meal booked at the Bayside Brasserie for 7pm. We walked through the Red Dragon Centre, passed the Dr. Who exhibition and after a short walk, we arrived at Cardiff Bay where there were lots of nice bars and restaurants

We had a lovely meal. The restaurant was nice and modern and the food was delish, and of course the company was brilliant. After dinner we went to Sue’s local pub Ely Jenkins

After a couple in Ely Jenkins, we went to Terra Nova bar, where Nat grabbed a table, and we all joined the two lads that were sitting there

Now I didn’t hear this conversation, but the lads (Matthew & Ash) got chatting to Nat and she asked them to guess how we all knew each other, and they said that we knew each other from a UFO forum ! not quite sure what gave them that impression Anyway Joh said there was a clue on our table (which was my Mickey Mouse bag), so they guessed we knew each other from a Disney forum ~ so Nat ended up buying them both a pint. I’m sure one of them said they used to work as a character at Disneyland Paris ~ but I’m sure they were taking the ‘Mickey’ out of us by then

We stayed at the Terra Nova for a couple of drinks and then walked back to our hotel.

 

[mandymouse]

Saturday 27th September

Surprisingly I slept really well on the first night (though I know that Nat & Joh had had a bad night due to the noise from the road outside our rooms). Sue had stayed in our room last night and had vanished early to take her daughter Vicki to work so we arranged to meet up with Sue at Starbucks at 10am.

Around 9am, Kaylee and I went down to reception to see if we could grab a coffee and we were joined a little later by Tam and Deb. We arranged a taxi into town, and when Joh and Nat came down we arranged to meet them at Starbucks once they had been joined by Claire and Theresa.

We had only been at Starbucks about 10 minutes or so when we were joined by the rest of the gang. After coffees, we first decended on Peacocks as we wanted to go and see Vicki, but also because Sue had given us all 40% off vouchers. Here is where I found out what keen shoppers I was with today. My goodness, some of those girls could shop for England and what seemed like hours later (though it was probably about ½ an hour later), Tam came out closely followed by Theresa

Our next stop was the Disney Store, as we wanted to have a photo taken outside of it, like we did last year. Well we asked the security guy to take it and we were told that we weren’t allowed to take photos in the shopping centre (blooming jobsworth!!). Here, we all split up for a while and we arranged to meet up at the Hard Rock Café at 12.30pm

Some of the serious shoppers, namely Nat, Theresa and Claire wanted to go to Primark, so Joh headed to Monsoon, and Kaylee and I went to the Blue Banana as I wanted to get my girls some scarves.

Nat was the first to emerge from Primark, within the allotted time, and she was closely followed by Claire. After a good while Joh went to look for Theresa, and Nat took this famous photo of Joh leaving Primark

We then left the town and headed to the Hard Rock Hotel. We arrived about 12.30pm and Deb and Tam were already there with Hilary (who was joining us for lunch) and Jules (who was joining us for the rest of the weekend).

We got seated and then enjoyed a very relaxing couple of hours chatting, eating and drinking cocktails ~ yes, and even Bahama Mama’s

After dinner, we said goodbye to Hilary (it was lovely to finally meet you), then the group split and the serial shoppers went back into town, and the serial drinkers went in search of a bar. Obviously, I stayed with the serial drinkers and as we left the Hard Rock Café we found some seats outside a bar and bought a couple of pitchers of Mai Tai

It was nice and sunny this afternoon, but we were sitting in the shade, so we left to find a bar with some sunshine. We found one once we passed the infamous Chip Alley. Well outside was quite busy, but inside was empty. Me and Kaylee ordered a couple of Margaritas for Jules and Tam and a couple of rum cocktails for us. Well we must’ve waited about 15 minutes for the Margaritas, they didn’t have a clue. By the time they had put table salt from little packets around the glass, the actual drinks didn’t look too good (though it didn’t stop Tam and Jules drinking them). It was getting quite rowdy here, and after having a guy dressed up like Dafydd from Little Britain rubbing his cushion filled tummy up against my back in there, we decided to head back to the hotel to get ready to go out that evening

Tonight we were eating at Strada at 8pm, so we arranged to meet in the lobby at 7pm

Most of the girls walked down to the Bay, but Kaylee, Jules and me got a taxi down (as I was wearing my killer heels). We stopped for some cocktails at the BA Orient as we were a little early ..

.. and then checked in at Strada for 8pm and we were seated straight away

Once again we had a lovely meal and a few drinkypoos and after dinner we headed over to Salt. The music in there was great, so within no time we were all boogie-ing to Erasure and other oldies before the DJ brought the music back up to date

I think Kaylee and Theresa headed back first, closely followed by Sue and Vicki, and once a few of us sat down, we knew we wouldn’t last long, so me, Deb, Tam, Jules and Claire left, leaving Nat and Joh (the dirty stop-outs) who I think headed back a short while after us

Of course, as Kaylee had gone back to the room first, and we couldn’t find our other key, she had cunningly disguised our room key by covering it with a bit of toilet roll and left in outside the room. Well I stood fiddling with the key to try and put a light on and accidently let go of the door and it slammed shut waking her up (sorry )

 

[mandymouse]

Sunday 28th September

I slept well again, and the next morning Kaylee and I went down to breakfast, though we were disappointed that there were no characters at the all you can eat buffet

Between Sue, Ian (who had come to pick Jules up) and Theresa, we we’re all dropped off at the station and after a quick coffee we headed up to our platforms to get our trains

Kaylee, Joh and Tam got one train and me, Nat and Deb were on a different one. The journey seemed a little longer going back, probably due to us feeling so tired and after saying goodbye to Deb in Gloucester, Paul met us at the station and took us home where Nat picked her car up from my house

All I can add is that I had an absolutely FANTASTIC weekend. We all had such a laugh and it was lovely that we got on so well

Thanks again girls for a brilliant weekend, and thank you Sue for organising our weekend too

I can’t wait for our next Girly Weekend away ~ Roll on 2009 !!!!

 

[Minniespal]

Fantastic report Mandy, looks as though you all had a wonderful time.

 

[jjk]

Fantastic report Mandy, I really hope to make the next one,looks like you all had an amazing time

 

[tony64]

Think yourself lucky there wasn't any scrapbook shops or you would have had to drag Theresa out.

 

[natalielongstaff]

your report has made me laugh all over again, we had such a good time

 

[BRobson]

Great trippie - sounds like a lot of fun

 

[mandymouse]

your report has made me laugh all over again, we had such a good time

Like we said on the way home Nat, we thought the Birmingham Girly Weekend was the best, but this one was even better

 

[natalielongstaff]

Think yourself lucky there wasn't any scrapbook shops or you would have had to drag Theresa out.

that was mentioned !

 

[PoppyAnna]

Great report Mandy and it looks like you all had a lovely time.....

 

[jockey]

Sounds as though you girls had a great time, I do hope I can make the meet in 2009

 

[sandym]

Looks like you girls had a lovely weekend. But no John Barrowman sightings?

 

[Goofysmate]

What a great time you all had
So pleased it went well for eveyone
The pictures were great thanks for sharing

 

[mandymouse]

Think yourself lucky there wasn't any scrapbook shops or you would have had to drag Theresa out.

Funnily enough Tony, I did mention that

Looks like you girls had a lovely weekend. But no John Barrowman sightings?

Tell me about it Sandy. I was gutted

 

[KayleeUK]

Think yourself lucky there wasn't any scrapbook shops or you would have had to drag Theresa out.

You must take Sue with you she was good at Theresa and Tam herding

Great report Mandy We should of got a picture of you and Daffyd

Thanks again ladies for the brilliant weekend!

 

[Strommie]

Brilliant report Mandy and fantastic photos. You all look like you had a brilliant time

 

[UKDEB]

Thanks for doing the trippie, Mandy - it's helping me through my withdrawal symptoms.

 

[mandymouse]

I'm going to copy everyone's photos onto here so they're all in one place

 

[mandymouse]

Just in case anyone is in any doubt about the alcohol count, I'll just leave you with this: Way to go Deb



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