Photo Diary: The Cotswolds

Last month I had a short break with my grandma visiting the villages in the Cotswolds district. Yes, it WAS indeed a coach trip and I WAS the only guest under 55, but so what?!

An amazing lunch we had in a tea shop. Had to take a picture, it was gorgeous. 

Stratford-on-Avon. 

Shakespeare's birth place in Stratford. 

I thought their library was pretty - especially in comparison to the one in my town. 

The Jester statue (still Stratford)

Thanks for looking,

Have you been on any trips or holidays recently? :)

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All photos in this post belong to Danielle at cupofloveliness. Thanks.

London trip: Sherlock Holmes & Carnaby Street

Good Morning! Just thought I'd update you with a few things I've been up to these past few weeks.
As my dad works in London, I visited him for a week to 'help out'. Basically, I did pretty much no work and he took a few days off work for us to be proper tourists and visit some of the places in London that I have always wanted to go.

My first impulse being of course the Sherlock Holmes museum in 221B Baker Street! After queuing for almost 2 hours, we explored the several storey house that is basically a replica of a real Victorian place with features to please all Conan Doyle fans. The gift shop is also fantastic - I couldn't resist buying a few bits of merchandise :)

One of  many great tea/cake experiences.

This was my first ever visit to Carnaby Street and I thought it was great. Spent a while in Brandy Melville's lovely boutique, mostly just admiring the wonderful decor (and bought a few things for my holiday to Greece in September too!)

As a self-confessed tea lover, Camellia's Tea House, also in Carnaby, seemed right up my street. While I mostly prefer the normal 'English Breakfast' tea, the variety of teas was immense. If I was feeling risky, some of the options included Brain Tea, Sleep Well Tea, Happiness Tea and even the Bobby Marley blend. However, I fancied a cold drink for once so I opted for their Very Berry Iced Tea, and tried my best to resist their chocolate brownies on display (and failed, clearly). The ice tea was OK, but the brownie was absolutely gorgeous. I'll leave you on that note.

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Photo Diary: Summertime

I'm lucky enough to live around some brilliant nature spots. These are some of my favourite photos that I've taken in the past few weeks during the transition from spring to summer, in locations including my local park and from when I recently visited a public hothouse/wildlife centre with my friends (strange day out, I know).

Thanks for taking a peek. What are your favourite places of nature that you like to visit?

View more on my Flikr

Danielle x

All photos in this post belong to Danielle at cupofloveliness.blogspot.com

Hay Festival 2014

Book art at the festival

I was so excited to go to this years Hay Literature & Arts Festival in Hay on Wye in Wales this year, even if it was just for 1 (Friday, Day 7) out of the 10 days in which it runs for. Book + food + music = my perfect day out so you could say I was in my element. Indeed, this festival has been visited by many familiar faces in the past including Rowan Williams, Carol Ann Duffy, Boris Johnson, Bono, Bill Clinton, and there were many additions to the list this year such as Benedict Cumberbatch(!!), Dame Judi Dench, Steve Coogan, Jacqueline Wilson, Stephen Fry, Paloma Faith, and more.

This was my first year attending the festival and, although most of the events were sold out because I hadn't booked in advance, I still had a really fantastic day!

Interior of one of the book shops 

Personal highlights/+:

• Discovering the bookshops around Hay on Wye, famous as the 'Town of Books'. In short walking distance I went in about ten, and they were all so original and quirky, especially in their decor. I also thought it was funny that many of them had a 'No Kindles allowed' policy (I daren't mention I had one in my bag that I used for the journey up!)
• Book signings! There are about 10 book signings throughout each day, open to everyone. 
• Being in the audience of the One Show filmed live from the festival. Funny being near something I watch regularly.
• The shuttle bus was only £1 for an all-day ticket. A great perk to the day as I pay at least £4 in my city.

Cons/-

• Parking! Took us a while to find a parking space but in the end we had a bit of luck and landed a space in a field directly opposite the entrance!
  
• Food prices - although I'm sure there were other, more reasonable venues to eat at, we were forced into a place where two salads and two pots of teas cost over £25 which we thought was just crazy.

I will DEFINITELY be coming back next year and do the whole 'festival experience' properly, perhaps camping and all. It's really not something to miss out on as a book enthusiast and recommend everyone goes at least once! 

Snapshots!*

 

       

        Poetry book shop in Hay on Wye                                                             Hundreds of Penguin Classics

Filming of the BBC One Show

Books everywhere!

Danielle x

All images in this post belong to Danielle at cupofloveliness.blogspot.com

Leeds, Thor and Bookish Blues

Morning! I hope everyone has had a great start to the week. I thought the post-Easter period was a fitting opportunity to resurrect this blog after an unnecessarily long 'hiatus' (can I even call it that after ONE blog post?!).

Anyway, I spent Easter in Leeds with my grandmother which was nice, not to mention hilarious (my grandma in Nandos: "is the WINE bottomless too?"). Yes, despite the fact that it was the hotel in which the coffin of the infamous Jimmy Saville was displayed in in 2011 (boo), the Queen's Hotel was great - it had everything we needed and more, and its Art Deco style, something I hadn't seen much of before (I'm a Premiere Inn/Travel Lodge enthusiast myself), was a welcomed bonus.

Its only flaw was, unquestioningly, the price of a cuppa in the hotel's bar/coffee shop: an order of 1 nothing-special-about-it tea and 1 latte cost almost a tenner (is that ridiculous or am I just stingy?!). Indeed, that aspect to the hotel wasn't my 'cup of tea' (the idiom, i mean - I didn't literally deny that I drank the tea. Bit awkward.)

Though I went there mainly to visit family, I still had pockets of time to waste, which were inevitably spent discovering how Leeds ranked shopping-wise. Here are a few of my buys:

Marvel Thor Basketball Tshirt - Urban Outfitters / Flower Necklace-watch (Vintage) - Pop Boutique / Celestial Bracelet -  Contemporary Enamels / Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell - I bought this on my kindle on a whim, having recently read  Eleanor and Park (a much welcomed light read after months of obeying my hefty uni reading list). I saw it for £2.39 on the Kindle Store and before I knew it I had clicked 'Buy Now' - oops!

Safe to say I was pretty satisfied! However, as a bookish* person I couldn't help but notice that in all the shops/arcades I passed I DID NOT SEE ONE BOOK SHOP except a comic book store (which I don't read, despite my Thor adoration - I think maybe a certain Chris Hemsworth is the reason behind this though. Just maybe). In fact, just now I googled 'book shops leeds' and an article entitled Where are all the bookshops in Leeds? was the second result. How peculiar.


On that note, I'd better stop here. I have an essay deadline which I have been pretending doesn't exist for weeks, that I really MUST crack on with. Goodbye! 

Danielle x

* this being a romanticised/politically correct term for someone who uncontrollably and at times psychotically hoards books despite already owning like 29 to-be-read-soon ones. For more embarrassing bookishness, friend me on GoodReads @ heydani :)

All images in this post belong to Danielle at cupofloveliness.blogspot.com