Life in Northern Towns

We had intended to go to Chester .  We had been a few times, but one of the biggest problems going to Chester by car is the parking - IT IS HORRENDOUS!  There are two car parks I go to, but both were packed and the traffic made it impossible to find another car park.  There's a park and ride scheme on the edge of town, but by this point I had lost the will to live to even bother trying that.  If you are intending to go to Chester, I really do recommend you take the train instead.  Although remember to take the express train rather than the one that stops at every stop.  If I remember correctly it adds about half an hour onto the journey. As I was more than a little hacked off trying to find a place to park, I thought we should go to the Hoole Road area instead and check out the little shopping area there.  From my research I knew there was a charity shop in the vicinity. So we headed back down the A56 to Hoole.  We did attem...

Ooh! Frodsham is a lovely place to visit. Before going to there all I knew about the place was that Gary Barlow was originally from here and my Dad recommended it.  My Dad's recommendations have been known to be misses rather than hits, especially after the Morecambe debacle, but this time he came up trumps. Off the M56 at Junction 11 we turned left and headed to the 'Historic Market Town' of Frodsham.  Driving into town the houses looked rather nice and well turned out.  On entering the town we had a choice of parking either on the main stretch of road where there was plenty of on street parking, by the station or at Morrison's (left at the junction).  We decided to park at the station, although we shouldn't have as it was just for rail passengers - well it was a Saturday, there were plenty of spaces and it was free. Anyway we walked into the town and we were pleasantly surprised.  All the pubs had plenty of character - the Cholmondeley Arms, the...