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Monthly Archives: March 2011

Let’s hear your favourite Google Street View in the UK!

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Posted by admin on March 21, 2011 – 8:36 am
Filed under Miscellaneous

There are some fabulous views in the UK and some of them you can even enjoy without so much as setting foot out of your car.  Of course, we’d recommend that you do explore a little further afield but, for the purposes of this exercise, we’d like to hear what your favourite Google Street View is in the UK.  We’ll set the ball rolling by proposing this view of Wastwater in the Lake District.

What’s your favourite UK Street View and why?  Please tell us by posting a comment on this blog post.

Useful links:
Hotels in the Lake District
B&Bs in the Lake District
Campsites in the Lake District
Holiday cottages in the Lake District
Tourist attractions in the Lake District

3 of Britain’s best brewery tours

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Posted by admin on March 20, 2011 – 11:37 am
Filed under Attractions, Eating & Drinking

Breweries abound in Britain and a handful of them will even let you have a sneak preview.  Here we’ve compiled a selection of some of Britain’s best brewery tours.  If you think we’ve missed one, please let us and all other readers know by posting a comment.

Let’s start with London. If you’re in the capital, the brewery to visit is probably the Meantime Brewing Company. They do everything from chocolate beer to more traditional brews. As breweries go, it’s comparatively new but it’s grown rapidly in the last 10 years. Scheduled tours are available at £15 per head, inclusive of VAT and, of course, a sample or two.

Next up, we’ll venture north to the Lake District. Jennings Brewery was founded in the village of Lorton between Keswick and Cockermouth in 1828. It continues to thrive from a base in Cockermouth to this day, using pure Lakeland water, and runs regular tours to allow you to learn about the brewing process. Adults £6.50; children £3.25.

Let’s cross the border now to Scotland and, more specifically, to the small, independent brewery, Black Isle.  Their slogan is “Save the Planet, Drink Organic” due to their love for brewing organic beer. Take a tour and then sample anything from oatmeal stout to heather honey beer.  Tours run Monday-Saturday throughout the year.

The ultimate phone for the Britophile?

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Posted by admin on March 19, 2011 – 9:54 am
Filed under Miscellaneous

Like a little nostalgia in your life?  Love Britain?  Don’t want to splash out hundreds of £s for an iPhone?  Then maybe this phone is for you!  This red telephone box mobile phone comes complete with a 65k color TFT screen, camera, MMS and SMS functions, plus GPRS/WAP 2.0 and polyphonic ringtones, including ‘Rule Britannia’ and ‘God Save the Queen’.   It’s usually available via this link but currently out of stock. However, they promise to pass on any enquirers to the manufacturer.

Useful link:
British shopping

£3.2 million boost to create community green spaces in Britain

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Posted by trev on March 18, 2011 – 5:25 pm
Filed under Miscellaneous

Natural England and the Big Lottery Fund’s “Changing Spaces” scheme have joined forces to transform open spaces around their local communities to create wildlife havens all around Britain.

The £3.2 million grant so far has been handed out to sixteen new projects which will help local communities create everything from small wildlife reserves in Warwickshire to a wildflower meadow in an Wolverhampton church yard and a linear park in Birmingham.

More grants are likely to be made available for similar projects anywhere in Britain – contact Natural England for details.

It seems, even in a recession, there is room for a little environmental improvement and perhaps even if we can’t get an instant financial fix, we can at least have somewhere to relax.

Signup now for Sunflower Guerrilla Gardening Day 2011

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Posted by trev on March 18, 2011 – 4:17 pm
Filed under Events

If ordinary gardening sound far too boring, why not signup for the fifth annual Sunflower Guerrilla Gardening day and be a gardening rebel.

Okay, so it’s rather hard to make this sound too rebelious, but the idea of Sunflower Guerrilla Gardening Day is that you signup for your sunflower seeds then go out into the countryside, onto roundabouts or any other public place and plant those seeds to brighten up Britain.

You can signup on the Facebook page for Sunflower Guerrilla Gardening Day or watch the video below for more details.

So go on, be a rebel and find all those most bizarre places where sunflowers will mysteriously appear this year.

The best seafood restaurant at English’s of Brighton

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Posted by trev on March 18, 2011 – 3:40 pm
Filed under Eating & Drinking

English’s is one of the oldest restaurants in Britain, and according to many serves the best seafood anywhere in the country, which is quite an achievement even if a little disputed elsewhere.

The restaurant is situated in 3 converted fisherman’s cottages on the seafront of Brighton, known for its lively lifestyles and connection to the swinging 60s. Today the seaside town is a great family favourite especially with day trippers from London, and many of those visitors head for English’s.

Seafood has been served from the location of this restaurant for over 150 years, and by members of the current family since 1945. Remarkably considering the reputation the restaurant has created, the prices are still very reasonable with lunch offers around £14.95 for two courses.

Nearby, the square often has live music playing, giving another reason to sit outside on the heated terrace and enjoy the fresh sea air and great food.

More Brighton Resources:
English’s of Brighton
Hotels in Brighton
Things to see and do in Brighton
Brighton holiday cottages

Cumberland sausage wins EU protection

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Posted by admin on March 18, 2011 – 2:45 pm
Filed under Eating & Drinking

The Cumberland sausage has followed in the footsteps of the Cornish pasty to be given EU protection and become Britain’s 44th protected food.  It is the first of Britain’s sausages to be given what is called PGI (Protected Geographical Indication) status which means that the sausages must be produced to an agreed method. Sausages displaying the PGI mark will have been produced, processed and prepared in Cumbria and contain at least 80% meat and be at least three-quarters of an inch thick. Cumberland sausage was first documented in 1911 but is thought to have a 500-year heritage that dates back to the 16th Century and the influx of German miners to the area.

Useful links:
Hotels in the Lake District
B&Bs in the Lake District
Campsites in the Lake District
Holiday cottages in the Lake District
Tourist attractions in the Lake District

Win tickets to Bloodstock – The ultimate heavy metal festival

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Posted by trev on March 18, 2011 – 2:15 pm
Filed under Events

If you like to rock hard and Bon Jovi just doesn’t cut it, then you need the Bloodstock festival in Derbyshire this August and for a limited time you can win tickets to this home of pure metal rock.

Bloodstock 2011 is expected to see around 10,000 heavy metal fans congrigate around Derby from Friday 12th until Sunday 14th August 2011 to see bands such as Motorhead, W.A.S.P, Rhapsody Of Fire, Devin Townsend Project, Angelwitch and many many more over three huge rock stages!

Not bad for a festival which started only 10 years ago in the Assembly Rooms in Derby which we kindof doubt would attract legends like Motorhead and W.A.S.P.

To enter the competition, scroll down to the bottom of this E-festivals page and answer the question.

You can also buy tickets for Bloodstock 2011 click here.

More Derbyshire Links:
Hotels in Derby
Campsites and caravan parks around Derby
Bloodstock Festival
Heavy Metal CDs on Amazon

The Queen – Royal art and image exhibition from this Summer

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Posted by trev on March 18, 2011 – 1:40 pm
Filed under Attractions, Events

All eyes might currently be on the Royal Wedding and Olympics, but 2012 is also a big year for Britain with the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee which a new royal photographic exhibition running later this will celebrate.

Over 60 years, The Queen has posed for many photographs and art works, but there are of course many created without royal input and this new touring exhibition by the National Gallery celebrates them all – from the traditional to the downright bizarre.

The exhibition will tour Edinburgh, Belfast, Cardiff and London between 25th June 2011 and 21st October 2012 and includes formal painted portraits, official photographs, media pictures and contemporary artworks by artists such as Beaton, Leibovitz and Annigoniwill. Some of the works in the exhibition have never been seen in public before.

Unofficial portraits will include photos by Eve Arnold, Patrick Lichfield and Lord Snowdon and paintings by Gilbert and George, Andy Warhol and Gerhard Richter.

The exhibition dates are:

National Gallery Complex, Edinburgh
25th June – 18th September 2011

Ulster Museum, Belfast
14 October–15 January 2012 (free admission)

National Museum, Cardiff
4 February–29 April 2012 (free admission)

National Portrait Gallery, London
17 May–21 October 2012

Boris ends London bendy buses to increase “fare-play”

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Posted by trev on March 18, 2011 – 12:52 pm
Filed under Transport

London Mayor, Boris Johnson, has revealed the real reason he wants to get rid of the so called “Bendy Buses” in London is because of a major financial flaw in the design which is losing TFL millions of pounds.

The bendy buses which as their name suggests, bend in the middle were designed to bring more public transport seats to London without increasing the number of actual buses, but they’ve never exactly been popular with the many Londoners.

When Boris came to power he immediately promised to get rid of them, but it turns this wasn’t becauseof the design or their mysterious ability to catch fire, but more because of a massive oversight by the designers – a ticket machine at the back of the bus.

The machine deals with Oyster Cards, but as the passengers don’t have to pass the driver it’s quite easy to avoid paying any fare at all, and much harder for ticket inspectors to instantly check. According to a new report, this oversight contributed to London buses losing around £40 million in revenue last year alone!

The London Tube network which is also run by Transport for London, lost an estimated £20 million to fare dodgers, despite the fact that over 20,000 people were prosecuted for not paying and 98,000 were given on the spot £50 fines. We assume the latter was for using tickets beyond the London Underground travelzone.

In total there are around 250 inspectors on the London Underground and 220 inspectors on the buses checking tickets, but there are plans to increase this significantly.

Oyster cards give discounted travel on most London buses, the Docklands Light Railway and London Underground.