Tasty Victorian treats at the seaside

The Victorian Tea Room is located on the premises of the Yesterday’s World Victorian Experience, a museum that showcases all kinds of paraphernalia related to daily life during Victorian times. The museum’s tea room is, together with their souvenir shop, located on the ground floor and both are open to the public without admission fee. While the museum was nice enough I really do not need to visit it every time I come to Great Yarmouth unlike their Tea Room where a visit has become a bit of a family tradition.

The Victorian tea room can be found directly in the middle of Great Yarmouth's Marine Parade, just opposite of the golden, sandy beach, not far from the pedestrian zone and in between a myriad of "entertainment venues" - which are nothing else but gambling halls - slap bang in the middle of everything.

The tea room covers the whole left side of the ground floor and decorated with Victorian prints, furnishings and china. The Victorian costumes of the waiting personnel were a hit with the kids and just add to the originality of the place.

 There is no need to wait to be seated and orders are taken at the table but you will need to go to the counter to pay. The menu offers typical Victorian specialties which consist of a large selection of daily fresh home-made cakes, sandwiches, cream tea and the traditional afternoon tea we are after.
Drinks include a variety of teas, coffees, soft drinks and then there is some ice-cream.

We always order the afternoon tea, at least for the husband and me, the kids are sometimes too tempted by their cake selection and they know that there will be enough on our plates to share.
What you get, and for a very reasonable price, is a 3-tier cake platter with a very generous amount of sandwiches. We’ve had tuna, salmon, ham, cheese and egg and all were very tasty, generously filled and fresh. The second tier will be a selection of cakes which so far has never disappointed, although their lemon cake is a little bit too lemony for my taste, while the husband loved it.
Last but not least you will find fresh scones with cream, butter and a wonderful jam to round up your meal. I’m crazy about scones and love the fact that they are huge plenty of space to pile the cream and jam on! Yummy!
We both like to eat but the whole portion is so large that there are always some sandwiches for the kids left over, who do not mind helping to finish them off at all!

I do not drink tea so we always get a pot of tea and a pot of coffee. The china they use is very pretty and there is enough for two cups in each pot.
The children have tried their chocolate fudge cake, the carrot cake and the ice-cream sundae and loved everything.

We all love the place, not just for the food but also the ambience and can only recommend a visit. Whatever we’ve ordered so far was fresh, very tasty and served quickly by a smiling and friendly waitress and at a very reasonable price too. What else could you wish for?

The only negative thing I can say about this place is that during our last visit in winter the room was slightly too cold and we had to keep our jackets on. Not so comfortable to eat with a thick winter jacket on.


http://www.yesterdaysworld.co.uk/great-yarmouth/victorian-tea-room/

Grime's Graves

What happened here?" asked my husband as soon as he got out of the car and had a look around. "Looks like a Swiss Cheese!"

And right he was, the pockmarked landscape at Grime's Graves really resembles an Emmental cheese with all those holes in the ground.

Exactly those holes were what we had come for. The shape of this strange landscape is nothing that has grown naturally and all those holes and hills are manmade – about 5000 years ago, the oldest ones probably about 3000 BC. Back in Anglo-Saxon times they must have thought that they were looking at ancient burial mounts and so they named the place after the pagan god of the underworld "Grim" (also known as Woden), which brought the site the nickname "Devil's holes". It took until the late 19^th century that one of these holes was excavated and people realised what they really were – flint mines that date back to the Neolithic Age.

Once my husband found out that I had made him to drive 1 ½ hours just to take a walk in scenery that resembles the moon (just in green, very green!) and to see an old mineshaft he wasn't very amused. "You've just got to be kidding!" was his remark and he looked as if he'd loved to send me straight to the aforementioned pagan god. He should have known better …

Nevertheless, we walked up to the small visitor centre and found out that there was no admission fee to the grounds but that the entrance to the mineshaft would cost £7.50 for a family ticket. We had our two little daughters, aged 5 and 7, with us and if you are travelling with small children please bear in mind that the entrance to the shaft for children under 5 is not permitted.

Next to the small reception/shop is a museum room with some displays of findings from the area. You can see what the flint was used for; there are some examples of clothing and items of daily use as they would have looked like during Neolithic times and some information on how the flint was excavated. All in all this is a very small exhibition and it won't take more than a few minutes to see everything.

The actual mine, the only one of the more than 300 that has been fully excavated and restored, is located just a few metres behind the visitor centre. It is the only Neolithic flint mine that is open to visitors in Britain.

"If you want to take a walk please stay on the paths as there are snakes around" warned the young lady who is in charge of the visitor centre. Not too keen on a live encounter with a snake we happily obeyed and walked on the paths that surround and connect the "holes" instead of climbing right through them. Most of them are very overgrown with shrubs, small trees and bushes in their lowest, middle, point and some of the shrubs have thorns, so even without the warning we probably wouldn't have been tempted to explore them too closely.

Traveling with kids is not always easy and if they don't like where you take them they can give you a very hard time. Now Grime's Graves is not exactly Disneyland and by the time we'd reached the shaft I started to wonder whether it really had been a good idea to come here as both our girls made long faces. I didn't need to worry as the mine sold itself to them. As soon as we entered the small hut that has been built on top of the entrance their faces lit up – they'd spotted the big box with bright yellow hard hats in the corner and the long ladder leading downwards.

The very friendly and chatty young man in charge confirmed that they were not only allowed to wear a helmet but that they would have to and that they also would need to climb down the ladder to reach the mine. Their faces lit up and, after a quick glance downwards, my youngest commented "Wow! What a big hole!"

They only let a certain amount of people down into the mine at one time and so we had to wait a bit. To shorten the waiting time the young man told us how the flint was mined and how those holes have been created and this is exactly what makes this place so fascinating. Each and every of those many hundred mines has been dug by using such primitive tools like red-deer antlers and bone. Now imagine the sheer size of those mines – the shaft leads 9 metre (30 ft) deep into the ground, there is one large chamber and from this lead several galleries even deeper into the earth. Once a dig was exhausted or it got too complicated to get the flint out the holes were filled up again when the next mine was opened. This explains the strange landscape. By the time the young man had finished his story and other visitors had left we were able to ascend into the mine even my husband looked more than just a bit impressed.

To get down the ladder wasn't a big problem, 9 metres sounds a lot and it gets darker the further down you get, but even our girls managed without any trouble. We each had to go right before one of the children to be able to hold them in case they had slipped but thankfully this didn't happen. The main chamber of the mine was surprisingly high and standing up wasn't a problem. They've put lights down there, during the times the mines were in use the people had to rely on natural daylight from above and only had primitive oil lamps for use in the galleries. These galleries are very narrow and not very high at all and whilst the girls had a great time exploring them it wasn't quite that easy for us. They only lead a metre or so into the ground and are blocked by bars but you can easily see into the illuminated chambers behind. You don't need to be claustrophobic to break into cold sweat at the pure imagination how it must have been to lie in those tiny tunnels to dig even further into the ground – with the full knowledge that there are already 9 metres of ground above you and that the whole construction could cave in.

As fascinating it was – I was glad to be on the ground again. I'm not too keen on enclosed places, especially if they are under ground, and if I hadn't been that impressed by the achievement of those people from 5000 years ago I'd never even had considered climbing down that mineshaft. Well, it was worth every minute and I can honestly say that these mines are one of the most amazing things I have ever seen.

As it was a lovely and sunny day we also took a walk around the site – it covers around 90 acres and is, even with its strange outlook, or even because of it, a great place for walking. The whole site wasn't very busy when we were there, apart from ours there were only 4 more cars in the car park, and we didn't meet anyone at all on our walk. There are many different plants and shrubs and it all is surrounded by Thetford forest – so plenty of scope for all those who'd like to walk a bit further distances than we can convince our daughters to do.

There are some picnic tables in front of the visitor centre but you'll have to bring your own food. They only sell ice-cream and chocolates, coffee and water and although we did enjoy the ice-cream it would be a bit meager for a picnic. There are also no toilets for visitors on the site (they advice you to disappear behind a bush as we have found out when one of the kids needed one) and, apart from the visitor centre, Grime's Graves are not accessible for wheelchair users.

The mines are easy to find if you have your own transport. They are located just of the A134 in between Thetford and Brandon and are well signed out. If you don't have a car it gets a bit more difficult as the next bus stop is about 2 miles away.

If you want to stay in the area for a bit longer and need accommodation – there are some hotels/B&B's in Swaffham, Thetford and Brandon and Bury St Edmunds is not too far away either.

Bewilderwood

Bewilderwood is a fairly new theme park near Wroxham, Norfolk. We went there after seeing an advert in a brochure and had no clue what was awaiting us, all we knew was, that a "Curious Treehouse Adventure" was waiting for us.

We've met Twiggles, Swampy. the Wood Witch and Mildred the Crogglebog, all characters from a book the creator of this theme park has written. The trails tell the story from the book - at least that is what I understood as I haven't read the book. They sell it there but after paying £40 for entry tickets I really didn't feel like spending any more.

You can take walks through the Marshlands and have fun exploring the tree houses. There are zip wires, jungle bridges and a maze. You can take a boats trip and enjoy the food from the snack bars or just bring a picnic. I'd recommend the picnic. The food looked nice but was much too expensive - as often in attractions of this kind - and there are plenty of picnic tables around.
We had a great day out and our kids, even though a few months have passed since our visit, are still asking when we'll be going back. Even we enjoyed going on all the climbing frames - which we had to as those tree houses are quite high and we didn't feel comfortable to let our two daughters, 5 and 7, alone go on them. Well - keeps you fit and it's really fun !!! Apart from the steep entry prices a great place to spend a day

For info on accommodation and more attractions in the area click here.

trivago makes headlines

My favourite travel website trivago has been all over the news lately. Travolution, TravelWeekly, the Guardian and many others had articles about the German based international platform lately. Now trivago also has been shortlisted as one of the top 100 finalists for the Red Herring Award in the EMEA region (Europe, Middle East, Africa). Past winners of this prestigious award include Google, Yahoo!, Skype, Netscape, Salesforce.com, and YouTube.
Now that's cool !

Can't understand the hype and no clue what trivago is about ? Let me tell you ...

Members of trivago can share their travel experiences with other members and visitors by publishing their reviews and photos. Apart from that you can engage in many other activities such as adding links to other websites that might be of interest to others, adding features and amenities to the hotels in the vast database and adding attractions. Generally spoken - Everything you see on trivago has been added by its members and visitors. Every member engaged in the community also benefits financially, as the community shares a large part of the commission from hotel recommendations. Active users can therefore contribute to their travel funds, and again use their newly gained travel information for the community. The Travel 2.0 portal trivago has added a Greek platform to its growing family which already includes English, German, French, Spanish, Swedish, Greek, Polish and Italian communities. Further expansion is already in planning.

So what's in it for visitors ?

Thanks to the trivago community, visitors can find personal travel reports, holiday photos, hotel, restaurant and destination evaluations, beyond compare. Therefore, an honest impression of the next holiday destination develops because of the fact that trivago members write and judge only that information which they share between themselves.
Apart from that, at trivago the customer can compare prices with one mouse click. A unique meta price comparison for hotels helps the client to find the cheapest deal from various well known booking platforms.

As I've been a member now for quite a while I am proud to see the success of trivago. It's a bit like seeing your kid growing up ...

If you got curious and want to see for your self what this is all about just click on the banner



Published recently in the Guardian :

Elevator Pitch: Trivago wants to make online travel truly objective

February 12, 2008 1:01 PM

Germany-based Trivago combines reviews, stories and photos from travellers with e-commerce services like hotel booking. It's not the only service in the very busy and lucrative travel vertical, but it has a loyal 40,000 followers that spend 20,000 hours on the site each month because of the heavy user-content approach.

Founded in April 2005, the site employs 21 staff including 10 country managers for its localised European versions including the UK, France, Germany and Sweden. The Dusseldorf-based firm has already had one round of funding from investors including the Samwer Brothers, who recently invested more than $10m in Facebook, and raised second round from Howzat, run by the Cheapflights.co.uk entrepreneurs.

Trivago's finance and business development head Malte Siewart explains how the site plans to compete in an already busy marketplace.

Trivago management Peter Vinnemeier, Rolf Schrömgens and Malte Siewart

• Explain your business to my Mum.
"Trivago is an independent resource for hotel information. We publish consumer reviews, photos and offer our users a special search engine that finds the lowest prices from a range of hotel suppliers too."

• What's your background?
"I joined the Trivago founders team in 2006, and prior to that worked at HSBC and Merrill Lynch advising small firm mergers and acquisitions and capital market transactions. My Trivago colleagues decided that they needed some commercial nous to complement their terrific product, technical skills and fast-growing user base - I was the right man in the right place at the right time."

• How do you make money?
"Trivago makes money from advertising partners. You cannot book with us. We are an independent information resource for travellers. We work with a wide range of industry suppliers and booking agents."

• How many users do you have now, and what's your target within 12 months?
"In January 2008, we are on target to achieve well above 2 million unique visitors in Europe. We're looking to triple that number during the next twelve months."

• What's your biggest challenge?
"We always see the biggest challenge as delighting the user. We want our 2 million monthly users to come back to Trivago and tell their friends about us whilst they are at it. We think that, in particular, we can do a better job making the site even easier for first-time users."

• Who is your competition?
"There are a number of competitors, as this is a very attractive area. The biggest competitors are tripadvisor in the UK and Holidaycheck in Germany."

• What's the weirdest business experience you've had so far?
"One potential new hotel partner had the cheek to ask if we would make all the prices from our existing hotel booking partners look more expensive than them!"

• If you had £10m to invest in another web business, what would you invest in?
"I'm too focused on Trivago to think about things like that."

• Where do you want the company to be in five years?
We want to be the first choice for people who want objective and comprehensive "hotel information before they book."

• Are you the next big thing?
"We want to be! The hotel market is huge and we think there is a massive opportunity to be a better hotel information resource and provide our service to new users. We're totally dedicated to hotel accommodation and travel community. We are proud of what we have achieved so far but we feel the best is to come."

trivago.com

Thaxted

Thaxted must be one of the most picturesque villages in Essex. At least it is in my opinion - ever since I've ended here by incident when I was looking for a shortcut to our new home not long after we've moved in a town nearby.
Thaxted has already been mentioned in the Doomsday book of 1086 and there are still enough very buildings in the town to prove that is indeed a very old settlement.

The old Guildhall dates back to the 14th century and can be found right in the town centre. It has been built by the masters of the Cutlers Guilt and now belongs to the local council. Apparently there is a small exhibition inside but this is open only on weekends in the afternoon.

If you take Stoney Lane from here, a narrow cobbled street in the right side of the guildhall, you will not only pass from some more medieval houses, including the one in which Dick Turpin is believed to have lived for a while, but also reach the real attraction of the town: It's parish church. St John the Baptist was built from 1340 to 1510 and features a 181 ft high spire that can be seen from miles away. The church is so grand and impressing that many regard it as the "Cathedral of Essex". Inside it is just as impressing as from the outside and there are some really remarkable stained glass windows to see.

Right behind the church you can find the former almshouses of the parish. The thatched building was originally the home of the priest and has been turned into an almshouse later, the newer addition, the tiled building, dates back to the early 18th century. Both houses have served as almshouses for more than 160 years. They are not open for the public but look nice and the path in between them will lead you straight to the windmill.

Built in 1804 by local farmer John Webb it is now a grade II listed building. The windmill can be visited and there is a small museum inside but it isn't open very often. I've never managed to find it anything but closed and the entrance door is as far as I've come so far.

After seeing all the attractions , which shouldn't take too long (unless you manage to find them actually open for public ) take a walk through the town and have a look at all those gorgeous old houses. There are plenty of pubs and cafes/tea rooms around so finding a place to take a break in between shouldn't be too hard.

Norfolk Beaches

I've lived in Cyprus for several years and the last thing I expected to be impressed by after moving to England were the beaches. In spring 2007 we've made our first trip to Norfolk and were so impressed by its beauty that we keep on going back. We - that is me, my husband and our two little daughters.
Of course there is so much more to Norfolk than just its beaches, especially the Norfolk Broads are remarkable and a paradise for birdwatchers. Of course you can also take a boats trip here, either on an organised boats trip or just by yourself in a rented boat. Alternativley you can rent a houseboat for a few days and live on the canals.

The first beach we've visited was Great Yarmouth. I'd seen it on photos before and knew that it was long and and wide but didn't quite it expect it to be that large. Forget about the pebbles at Brighton or Southend-on-Sea - this is lovely fine powdery sand and almost white. The beach is not only more than 15 miles long but also wide and spacious and very clean. We've managed to end up here on a bank holiday weekend which was also the hottest of the year - and the most busiest - and there was still lots of space on the beach without feeling too enclosed by other visitors. The town itself was buzzing and the main pedestrian area was so full that you could hardly walk but the beach still appeared to be half empty, even there must have been thousands of people on this particular day. You can rent a

beach chair for the day, facilities are plentiful, and there are enough of snack bars closeby. We've tried some of the restaurants along the promenade and food was a bitter disappointment. As beautiful as the beach is - the food was "Greasy Spoon" quality.Of course there is also the inevitable pier - this is England after all - and there are some amusement parks with kiddie rides, minigolf etc along the promenade.

A few kilometres into the sea there is a wind farm called Scroby Sands. The windmills are clearly visible from the beach and it is possible to take a boats trip out there. Apparently there are seals living on the base of the wind mills.

Much more quiet and relaxed was our trip to the beach in Caister. We went in September and the snack bar on the beach was already shut. We still had a great day, collected some sea shells with the girls, took a long walk along the water and didn't miss the pier and fun fair atmosphere one bit.

Sheringham is located in North Norfolk and we ended up here as we had promised the kids a trip on the Poppy Line, a steam train that departs from the Victorian station of the small seaside resort. A trip to the beach wasn't really on our itinery but we managed to see the sunset.

Our trip to Hunstanton, again in North Norfolk, had to wait until November. This time we weren't so lucky with the weather and it was a cold and stormy day. There is a promenade high above the beach from which we were watching the waves coming in.If you've ever suffered from a hang-over - if this doesn't clear your head out nothing will !