Lilah I just returned from an overnight adventure in Bath. We took the train to Bath (1.5 hours) on Thursday and stayed overnight in a hotel and came home on Friday afternoon. It was Lilah's first ever hotel stay. We visited the hotel pool twice. We ate dinner at Pizza express. We watched TV in bed! We saw the Roman Baths. We saw a play. It was a BIG adventure.
The friday train home was medium busy. I used to take this train for work often, and remember feeling like strangers were always sitting next to me. This time, Lilah and I had a table seat, with two empty seats across. It turns out, as much as people love a table seat, people hate sitting near children. All seats around me were taken, the two across from us at the table were empty the whole time.
This weekend is a busy weekend - two play dates on Saturday and Andy is doing a 10k on Sunday. We might all be leaving the house together on Sunday to visit family. I am hoping to get a Peloton ride or two in, and I am seeing a friend for dinner on Saturday night as well.
Do you love a hotel breakfast? Would you sit across from a child on a train or chose to sit next to someone else?
Anytime that eggs benedict is a breakfast option, it's the right choice. I wouldn't choose to sit across from any child, but if it's a child in my family then sign me up. What a fun trip!
ReplyDeleteTBH I don't love the hotel breakfasts where I stay - it's always a buffet of dry scrambled eggs, bacon or sausage, and some kind of potatoes. It works but it's just blah. The best hotel breakfast that I've had in recent years was the hotel that we stayed at for my niece's wedding. What I loved is that my extended family was there, and that the food was standard freezer breakfast sandwiches.
I forgot some hotel breakfast can be so meh. I like it when they cook a fresh breakfast for me. I don't think I've had freezer breakfast sandwiches before, but I would definitely enjoy even a bad hotel breakfast if I had a family with me to enjoy it.
DeleteHow fun! I was in Bath during an England trip my senior year of high school. I briefly considered trying to squeeze it in on our upcoming London trip but it’s pretty far/would eat up too much time I think.
ReplyDeleteI would not choose to sit by a child, lol!! Even one who looks well behaved because you just never know. 😆😆😆 (Not sure what that says about me, as a parent, but oh well. Haha.) I do sympathize greatly with parents on planes when their child freaks out but I still simultaneously can’t help but feel annoyed to listen to it. Lol!! Even though I have totally been there and it’s the worst most stressful thing as a parent!!
Oops this is Kae. On phone and got stuck in anonymous mode.
DeleteAhh Bath is lovely but probably not worth visiting as compared with all the amazingness of London. I'm sure your intinery is full already but I also found Oxford to be a pretty spectacular day trip from London, but there is just so much in London already. I love reading about your trip planning!
DeleteI probably wouldn't sit next to someone else's child either. And yes I totally agree about planes... a big reason we are not currently flying anywhere is that I just don't want to be that chaos family on a plane. I would rather wait until the kids are a bit older and be a moderately less chaos family. I'm excited to fly with just Isaac and Lilah soon because the plane is 3-3-3 seating to we are taking one set of 3 all to ourselves.
This is so lovely! My daughter’s dream girl’s trip is listening to our playlist on the ride, hotel pool at least 2x, room service cookies and craft videos before bed, and hotel breakfast. It’s the fun I never knew I wanted!
ReplyDeleteI will definitely do it again, we could have gone for any hotel with a pool and spent the day swimming and watching TV and she would have had a great time. I would also have had a great time!
DeleteHow fun! I have always wanted to go to Bath! I find hotel breakfasts in Europe to be much better than the ones in the US. I was in Stockholm and they had an all you can eat spread with US, Swedish and other European foods and I was on a hiking trip and I went up to get more like 5 times so I could try everything. It was lovely. However, in the US chains, it is usually just so so.
ReplyDeleteI probably would not sit next to the child, BUT if the option was standing or sitting next to a child on a long ride, I would probably sit next to the child. I have headphones!
I am remembering now that UK hotel breafkast are generally so much better than US. I remember when we were in the US and the hotel included continental breakfast it usually meant gross boxes of cereal and some stale gross muffins. I knew this hotel had a good breakfast, but I would be disappointed if a hotel breakfast didn't have a good spread of meat, cheese, fresh-ish bread, and some fruit. I bet the breakfast in france are extra delicious.
DeleteI am with you on the standing vs. sitting next to kids!
One on one adventures with kids are so great. I went to an overnight with L (my oldest, 7 y.o.) to NYC last Christmas and it was so great. We made some amazing memories. Just being in the big city after bucolic NJ was incredible for her. Riding the subway, waking the blocks, sitting in cafes. I would sit across from them- I like my space :) Same with cafes/restaurants - I love you but I am not sitting side by side.
ReplyDeleteYour trip sounds amazing! I am excited to someday take the kids to London (my NY equivalent haha) for the same adventure.
DeleteI always sit across from people/kids at restaurants but on the trains I often sit next to my kids. I think maybe to pen them in a bit? Or maybe so someone else didn't sit next to them, which I now realize probably wouldn't have happened anyways....
What fun for you and Lilah! Just did a weekend 1-on-1 with my older kid to a family wedding, and while it sometimes felt like wall-to-wall complaining whenever we had to do something on the itinerary an adult had thought up, kiddo LOVED staying in a hotel, tv in bed, and even the packaged "continental" breakfast snacks. But the biggest hits were the pool and getting to play in snow for the first time. -rachel
ReplyDeleteThere was a LOT of complaining. Also, I asked her what her favourite part of the trip was (play? Pool? Roman Baths? Pizza dinner?) and she said "watching TV". Also she stayed up till 10pm and only fell asleep when I said "get dressed we are catching the last train home" and she finally said "okay I'll go to sleep" and did. So... it was something that is already more fun in memory than experience.
DeleteHahaha. Here's to memory's lighting fast ability to rewrite how we feel about what happened!
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