Summer Stories - Day 3 In Hull, swimming for fishes

Oh dear, day 3 has finally arrive, marking the last day of our summer trip! Saddening as it was, we still enjoyed ourselves fully, stuffed till we exploded (well, not really boomed~) and saw many great things! Back to the trip, a visit to Hull is incomplete without visiting the famous underwater museum, 'The Deep'.

Don't let the shabby exterior fool you, cause like I said, it's underwater. For those doofus out there, that means underground as well! (all pun intended, sorry for those who didn't get it! Wa-ri :D)

Well, the admittance was a tad costly but it was worth the 5 hour tour. Inside, you'll be able to find jellyfishes of all colors, starfishes, Sharks, Manta rays, octopus, sea snakes and so many more! You name it, you've got it! Truly an aquatic paradise, and that's still an understatement. Equipped with the latest science gadgets and gizmos as well as mini games, the museum hopes to let kids enjoy the tour experience to its fullest and yet still able to learn about aquatic life as well. Man, they should actually pay me for doing free promotions for them.

Sadly to say, those fancy devices and stuffs were aimed for 8 to 15 year olds. Heck, we are about the ages of 21 till 25, and yet we don't care! XD

Back to retrospec, enjoy the following pics =)

First thing on display, Live action of 2 seahorses making out! Aww~

Up next, colour displays by the jellyfish platoon =)

How can something icky be so elegant!

Baby Lobster

Baby Seasnake

Giant Yellow Sea snake trying 'hard' to blend in, LOL

After the Aquatic museum was the maritime museum back at the heart of the city centre. But before going into the place, some random graffiti on the ground caught our attention

The Hull Maritime Museum

For those who do not know what maritime is, please look it up =)

Graffiti by the local kids

Now, that was 10 mins of my life gone wasted, haha! Back to this particullar museum, it houses displays on fishery, sea hunting, and the various ships that once docked in this once glorious fishing port. Not much to describe here, cause I've been blogging for 4 hours and am sleepy at the moment. XD

Skeleton left behind from hunting a 'Right Whale'

Called 'Right' cause it was the right size of the right type to catch

Stuffed Polar Bear

and the skeleton remains.... ;-(

Man, the poor baby didn't want to depart from the mum, even after she's dead..

Too many ship models to show, so just gonna show a few of them...

Well, besides looking at antiques, we still had to fool around right? :D

Notice that this dog doesn't have any tail at all! O.o

Woo-kie! With the museums done, we finally headed out for lunch! And oh-boy were we HUNGRY! Try walking and touring for hours without eating! And, no, 'makan angin' does not count! (Lame sia!).

Lunch was at Princess Quay (pronounced as Princess Key) which is the largest mall in Hull and sorta felt like 1U's new wing. Even though it was a Sunday, we didn't get to order their famous sunday roasts as they ran out of vegies. Heck, who need vegies right? Still the chef insisted that he would not cook if some of the core ingredients. Go figure~~~

Next up on the menu's choice was pizza. Well, good enough for me!

(lol-ed when we notice that we went to York the day before and didn't even try any famous York Puddings!)

Bought this from the perfume shop right before lunch. High time that I needed one.

Some say it smells like Beckham's sweat, LOL!

Simple Lunch

Once we finished lunch, we we only had 20 mins to rush to the next location, which was Fort Paull. The upside, according to history, some airplane crashed into the middle of the fort and no explosions or lost of lives occured? The downside was, we arrived like 10 mins after the supposed last entry time. Extreme bummer indeed...

Instead, we just went touring the country side, admiring the landscape before heading back to Notts for Kebab and Curry Rice! And thus ends my first summer holidays~

and finally, Ciaoz! Signing off,

~L'Heure Bleue~

Summer Stories- Day 2 in York and Hull

Time for Day 2 of summer break! Apologies for the long delays. I almost forgot that I have a blog to maintain and my Master's Project is giving me a serious toll on my health.

Neways, Day 1 ended with a long stroll in the historic yet avant garde' City of York. A very contradictory compliment right? But yea, I stand firm to it. Beautiful, plain yet different from other UK cities i visited so far. So, day 2 began with us waking up as early as 7am! Had our simple breakfast and off to the city centre we go! Did I mention that the bitchy receptionist snatched our keys, dump it in the box and just smirked farewell to us. Rude much! O.O"

Breakfast Lounge

Had a full and proper English breakfast for once

So back in the city, we were actually on our way to the train museum, when we saw the Marching Squad of the York Regiment lined up right in front of York Castle. So once more we stopped by the castle/dungeon to see what was going on. It was some sort of yearly event to commemorate the soldiers' contribution during the World Wars or something~ Well, at least BBC and some VIP(S) and the Duke was there? Weirdly enough, Soldier Day was a week away in Newcastle and yet they do this now? Oh well~

The entire contingent mainly spanned of the royal army of york, retired regiments, volunteer forces from local schools and 2 horses! Shame on the horses who kept pooping while it was 'marching' it's way around the crowd? =P

Flag Bearers discussing formation and routes one last time

VIPs, dukes and Army Generals, front and centre!

A fine day to start the march from Clifford Tower

So, before long, the entire ceremony started. The contingent commander (who was stationed right in front of me) began shouting and all. Amazed that the entire contingent could even hear his voice. The starting area had such a large open space that you can hardly hear anything from the other end of the square. Oh man, this made me miss my old kawat days~

These are the retired army men, and believe me, they DO KNOW how to properly march!

SALUTE!

Almost crippled men, who still joined in the march in honor of their comrade, either living the the deceased~

The poop-maesters! Why? See next pic...

Those two horses kept leaving these droppings in their wake!

Ewww!!!

Despite the repeated small rain hails and hot sun shining, the entire thing went quite well. Respect to those retired army men who even came to join the parade despite the mobility restrictions. Thankfully men invented those assistant vehicles huh?

Right after the marching parade, we rushed all the way to the famous York's Viking Museum. For those who do not know, when England was invaded and populated by the vikings, the English King conducted a long campaign against them which lasted for generations. Alas, the vikings were pushed to their final stronghold, which was York (or Yor'vick as it was called then) before finally getting 'the boot' out of England =)

The museum was pretty much filled with animatrons speaking in old Yor'vick and current English

More animatrons depicting everyday life in Yor'vick. This was the busy morning in the market street

Real Life coin-temperer making souveniers for everyone. Notices the thing he hammers into tempers the metal with coin insignias.

Two words --> 'Preserved Shit'

=D

On the way back, spotted a Ferrari!

Before moving on, take note that this IS the proper way of posing with a COOL CAR!

and....

This is the improper way! XD

(Lynn is going to kill me.....)

but she's back in China, haha!

York Train Museum was next on the itinerary, which houses most of the train models ever built in the UKs. With models as early the 1820s till the advance bullet trains, all of them were dissected and put on display. (Dam, I actually forgot to take pics of the Bullet Train! Arg!)

You can't possibly talk about UK trains without mentioning Eurostar, LOL

Royal Insignia

First ever steam engine train, The Rocket

Woosh~

Credits to anyone who's able to guess what's this!

Of course a pose before leaving!

and finally, highlight of the evening, directly take out from the Harry Potter filming site!

(hey CeDong, it's here in York! Not King's Cross!)

With only minutes to spare, we had to bid farewell to York and began driving for an hour on the freeway. Next destination was Hull, where fishermen once lived! Home to er.... cheap shopping and fish museums? For our back passengers, Diana and Lynn, they were thankful that they got to sleep, coz we didn't get much rest since 7am. Me and driver Xiong Ling had to keep our eyes wide open, as she needs to drive and i need to make sure she doesn't fall asleep XD

Once we arrived in Hull, everyone just slept for the entire evening. Me on the other hand decided to go out for a short stroll in the city centre, despite it being a late Saturday evening and the time was already 4.30pm. The walk was actually enticing! Seriously felt like walking in Sungai Wang or KL's 'Chee Cheong Kai'. Maybe I was missing home much?

Yea, after an hour stroll to various places, finally came home for dinner. Best part was, we had dinner at a Malaysian Joint called 'Restaurant Tropicana'! It was a funny setting though, as the food are from Indonesia and KL themed, whilst the chef himself is a Sabahan who migrated here at 10! Oh well, as long as I got my Nasi Lemak and Beef Rendang, who could ask for more =)

Nasi Lemak

Notice Beef Rendang in the middle tray

Yum, sambal prawns~

Apetizers. We got extra portions compliment from the chef =)

Sup Soto, another compliments from the chef

Classic Goreng Pisang with ice cream and honey

With dinner chowed down, we just practically strolled around the city centre in the car. FYI, the temp was like 13 degrees! SOO NOT THE WEATHER FOR RANDOM WALKING! In the end we just returned to the motel and rested. Embarrassing enough, once i reached the bed at 11pm, I fell asleep within 5 minutes! Meantime the girls chatted on till like 2 in the morning . Thankfully nothing happened to me, or so I thought! Haha~

The only pic from our night stroll

This is during the York Army Regiment March

PS: Due to FB probs, the video can only be viewed in blogspot. Sor-wee =(

Signing off

~L'heure Bleue~