This November, Friday 9th until Monday 12th, to be precise, me and my lovely mum visited the beautiful populous city of Birmingham. On our city break we went to the Alexandra theatre to see Dirty Dancing – The Classic Story on Stage (it was incredible), Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, Bullring shopping and the city centre, Cadbury World, National Sea Life centre, as well as dining at many swanky restaurants, particularly at Brindleyplace leisure, opposite from our posh 4* Jury’s Inn hotel on Broad Street… Please continue reading for more detailed descriptions of our travels, with accompanying photography 🙂

Dirty Dancing – The Classic Story on Stage

On the Friday evening, me and mum saw Dirty Dancing at the Alexandra theatre. We were seated in the stalls, row K, right in the middle, with the best possible view of the performance. The show was absolutely fantastic. The dialogue was very similar, it included all the memorable quotes from the film;

“I carried a watermelon. I carried a watermelon?!”

“I’m scared of walking out of this room and never feeling the rest of my whole life the way I feel [dramatic pause!] when I’m with you” and the classic…

“Nobody puts baby in the corner!”

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092890/quotes 

We were very pleased about this 🙂

Kira Malou, who played Baby, really perfected the character’s mannerisms, and Michael O’Reilly, playing Johnny, projected a sexy husky voice almost double to the gorgeous late Patrick Swayze. And boy, did O’Reilly have sex appeal! There was more than a few wolf-whistles echoing around the theatre throughout the show, particularly during the scenes in which Johnny was topless, funny that! 😛 The entire performance was quite naughty and raunchy, to be expected, hehe… And the dancing and music of course was simply sensational! They did the lift too, yey! At the end of the show, there was a well deserved standing ovation, everyone got up singing and dancing; the atmosphere was electric! Brilliant, we both proper loved it. Mum purchased a t-shirt, me a Dirty Dancing hoodie official merchandise, as well as two programmes. An experience to remember most definitely 🙂

Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery

Whilst in Birmingham, we had a walk around the Museum and Art Gallery, free to enter (always a bonus, lol). The museum has, notably, a vast collection of Pre-Raphaelites works, but also showcases Baroque art, Ancient Egyptian artefacts – there is a Greek and Roman gallery, a gallery solely dedicated to the fascinating history of the city, The Birmingham School of Art gallery and so on and so forth. The gallery which most intrigued me however was the Spiritual Life faith gallery. I was very interested to learn about the different faiths practised in such a multicultural, diverse and rich city, as my prior knowledge of such religions was rather limited. It sparked an interest for sure, and I have since researched some faiths further, particularly Hinduism, which I never knew actually resonates greatly with me and my personal philosophy of life. The museum and art gallery also showcased a great exhibition ‘Women Power Protest’. Commemorating the 100 year anniversary of women’s right to vote in the UK, the exhibition showed contemporary and modern artworks from local artists, Birmingham’s collection, and the Arts Council Collection, with explored themes including; activism, dignity and hope; illustrating the inequalities and injustices women have experienced, exploring how women’s bodies are depicted, and drawing attention to how, slowly, women’s experiences are becoming more visible in the world of art and artistic expression. Inspired by feminist activists and artists, the exhibition aims to;

“raise awareness, provoke debate and ask just how much has changed for women?” http://www.birminghammuseums.org.uk/bmag 

A very positive step in the right direction, in my opinion 🙂

Bullring shopping and the city centre

Whilst in Birmingham, me and mum obviously went into the heart of city centre, where the ginormous Bullring shopping centre is. The glistening decorations hanging inside the Bullring were simply stunning. It was really lovely because outside the Bullring, near St Martin’s Church, there was a Christmas themed Snow House globe which served alcoholic beverages, and what we opted for, delicious frothy hot chocolates, yum yum 🙂 – as well as a few small Christmas food stalls, selling German sausages, and Belgium waffles, yum yum again, hehe 🙂 Really puts you in the festive spirit! 😀 We also had a nice stroll around the Chinese Quarter, not far from the Bullring!

Cadbury World

On the Sunday morning, me and mum travelled from Birmingham New Street train station to Bournville, to visit the highly anticipated Cadbury World (me and mum both love chocolate!) We learnt of the origins of the cocoa beans, and how cocoa trees were central to Aztec culture, were told of how entrepreneur Quaker John Cadbury first began his chocolate business all those years ago in Victorian Bull Street, enjoyed a cinema experience with special effect – a visual presentation showing how Cadbury chocolate is made in the factory, we had a play with liquid chocolate, writing our names “ ❤ Debbie and Lauren ❤ ” on the demonstration table,  we stepped onto the magical ‘beanmobile’ and enjoyed a gentle chocolate wonderland Cadabra ride, with many familiar enchanting chocolate characters (mum absolutely loved this!), watched chocolatiers demonstrate their impressive chocolate making techniques, sampled some warm Dairy Milk liquid chocolate with a choice of scrumptious toppings, and had great fun having our photo taken with the Green Screen experience, as well as posing for pictures with the Cadbury characters! Ace!

National Sea Life centre

On our last morning in Birmingham, me and mum ventured to the National Sea Life centre, situated on the Water’s Edge of Brindleyplace complex, within very easy walking distance from Jury’s Inn. We were very excited to see all the magnificent sea creatures, me and mum are both massive animal lovers! It certainly did not disappoint. We sauntered leisurely around the sea life centre, mesmerised by all the delightful creatures; octopuses, seahorses, sea turtles, sharks and stingrays (arghhh, haha!), jellyfish and so on. Our personal favourites however were the playful pretty penguins! They’re so cute and adorable with their little waddle, lovely animals!  Great visit!

Brindleyplace leisure

During our time in Birmingham, me and mum dined out at quite a few deluxe restaurants, cafés and bars, especially at Brindleyplace leisure complex; including Café Rouge, Zizzi’s and The Slug and Lettuce, as well as eating at Ed’s Easy Diner, on the waterfront overlooking the tranquil canal. We are both big foodies, and regularly go out for meals when back home in Yorkshire, so obviously it was not going to be any different on our little Birmingham city break! Very delicious and yummy food Birmingham has to offer!

Conclusion   

Overall, me and mum had an absolutely amazing time visiting Birmingham! I would actually say, it was my favourite city break / holiday away with mum, and we have gone on quite a fair few trips together, including; Liverpool, London and Newcastle in the UK and Amsterdam and Paphos abroad. It was so good because it was not at all what we were expecting. Before we went away, a few people told us Birmingham was not a nice place to visit at all, that is was a bit rundown, slightly squalid and unpleasant. I almost cancelled our trip. We found it to be the total opposite – a very aesthetically pleasing, vibrant and exciting cosmopolitan city. Every Brummie we met was so so friendly too… In a nutshell…

Saw babby in Dirty Dancing!

Brum was bostin!  

Tara-a-bit!   😀

Bibliography

https://dirtydancingontour.com/ [Accessed 21st November 2018]

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092890/quotes [Accessed 21st November 2018]

http://www.birminghammuseums.org.uk/bmag [Accessed 21st November 2018]

https://www.cadburyworld.co.uk/en [Accessed 21st November 2018]

https://www.visitsealife.com/birmingham/ [Accessed 21st November 2018]

https://www.brindleyplace.com/leisure/ [Accessed 21st November 2018]

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