My sister, Sue, her daughters Delaney and Kendall and her partner Dale, and Tim and I decided to have a family
vacation. The timing was perfect as my half brother, Tony (my Dad's son
from his first marriage), who lives in the UK, was getting married at
the end of June, in Kent. So the UK it was and we added on a bit of Spanish culture and then went to Barcelona.
First Stop - London
We rented a three bedroom apartment just outside of downtown London, near the O2 Arena, east of downtown London.
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| View from our apartment on The Thames |
On our first night in London, my brother Tony and his fiancé, Suzanne, came up to London, from Kent, to join us for dinner. It was a great evening catching up. We have seen each other here and there but we hadn't been ALL together, as a family, for around 18 years.
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| Suzanne Leonard and Tony Young |
The next day Sue, et al, woke up at the crack of dawn and heading to Harry Potter World while Tim and went into 'town' for a little sightseeing, but mostly adidas business.
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| Dinner out!! |
On the day of Tony and Suzanne's wedding, we rented a van and Tim drove us to West Malling in Kent to see Tony and Suzanne before the wedding.
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| The very nervous Bride. |
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| The calm, cool and collected Groom. |
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| The Young siblings |
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Tony and Suzanne's house
with their new conservatory. |
After a quick visit with them and then headed to The Angel (one of Tony's favourite local pubs) for a quick beer
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| Sue and Dale at The Angel. |
and then off to the ceremony.
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| Mr. and Mrs. A. (Tony) B.R. Young |
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| Nice! lol |
The wedding was wonderful and it was great to see my nephews, Bobby and Paul after many many years.
Saturday was a day of wondering as a family and on our own (it was a rainy day, can you tell?).
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| In Hyde Park |
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| Hyde Park |
On the Saturday night Sue had arranged an evening
with our cousins, on my Mum's side. It was a great evening in the same Pub that my Mum
and Dad had their first date - the
The Grenadier, in posh London neighbourhood of Belgrave. We missed you Charlie and Michelle!!!
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| The Grenadier |
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The Girls
(less Annie Mackenzie as she had to catch a train all the way back to Newark) |
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| The Boys |
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Jack and Tom
(Cousin Jennie and Malcolm's boys)
and a pub regular in the background!! |
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| In the tube station on our way home after a long and wonderful evening. |
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Great selfie.
(Oh, did I tell you that we caught the last train to home
and didn't know it until we got to our stop) |
We went to Brick Lane on the Sunday, which is 'THE' day to go to the Brick Lane Markets.
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These coloured bikes are all the rage in Europe.
A lot of them are just single gear. |
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| Love it! |
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| Tim's £5.00 coffee (nearly $10 Cdn) |
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| He wasn't going to tell me but I came into the coffee shop. OMG |
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| Some great wall art. |
It wouldn't be one of our blogs without some food pictures, from the market in Brick Lane.......
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| A great cake! |
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| Real names of hot sauces. |
After a great time in London we all headed to Barcelona for ten days.
Barcelona (aka BCN or Barca)
As Tim and I had been to BCN a couple of times before, we toured Sue and family around for a couple of days. We went to the beach, the Boqueria Market, walked The Ramblas, had pintxos and tapas at the bars and tried various types of wonderful Spanish wine. One day Sue took the girls to Montserrat, on the train and had a wonderful time.
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| Great fresh juice stall at Boqueria Market. |
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| Wine bar at Boqueria Market |
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| Yoga on the beach! |
Another day we all walked up to
Sagrada Família Church. It truly is an amazing piece of architecture that has still being built. It started in 1882 and is expected to be completed in 2026. We would have loved to have gone inside but the line up to get tickets was 30 mintutes and the line up to get in was two hours long, so we enjoyed it from the outside.
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| Amazing! |
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| Some of the detail! |
One night Tim, Dale and I went out 'clubbing'....
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| Tim and his new BBF |
One day Sue, Dale and Delaney went shopping and Tim, Kendall and I took the subway up to Placa D'Espanya. There, Barcelona's old bull ring has been converted to a mall. Barcelona banned bullfighting in 2010.
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| The apartment we put an offer on....but to no avail. |
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| The apartment had beautiful features. |
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| and a nice modern kitchen. |
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| A night out eating tapas and pintxos (a small snack typically eaten in bars - traditional in Northern Spain) |
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| A rainy morning in front of Bascilica de Santa Maria del Mar |
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| Our last dinner in Barcelona. |
It was a great trip. We are sure to do another one again soon.
Love you Showers Family.
Tim and Kendall 'holding' the flame!!!
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