Jarrod was first out this morning, and returned with his school friend Liam who is living in Clapham and caught a train to Newcastle to spend the weekend with us.

We then added to our number again, meeting our family friends and Newcastle locals, John and Judy Smee across the road from our apartment at the Copthorne Hotel for coffee.

John then led us on a walking tour around the city, stopping to show us the important and historical sites along the way, like the Castle Keep, Newcastle Cathedral, Christmas Village Markets, Newcastle University, Hancock Museum and other sites.

We stopped for a quick lunch at Five Guys at 2pm, but told the kids not to eat too much as John had booked a restaurant for dinner, but we could only get in at 4.30pm. Apparently something like 54,000 people descend on the city this weekend each year for Christmas parties at the 250 different venues around the city. There is also a Newcastle United home game tomorrow.

John is a volunteer with the Street Pastors UK organisation and is rostered on each month to deal with situations that arise in the city centre – for example, last weekend he was quayside at 4am dealing with a domestic violence victim who had escaped and needed assistance. One of his fellow Street Pastor team leaders called Simon owns an Italian restaurant called Lui’s down by the water, and he was happy to host the ten of us for dinner at 4.30pm – and it was genuinely one of the best Italian meals we’ve ever had!

Jarrod and Liam then headed back to stay with the Smees, while Abi and Tom wandered down to Tesco and Ross and I did another load of washing and were in bed asleep by 9pm!

Note: I was introduced to packing cubes before our last trip to Europe nine years ago, and it was life-changing. Earlier this year I discovered Lucent Globe environmentally friendly laundry detergent sheets. LIFE-changing. So easy to take overseas, clothes smell good and clean…I wonder if they need an influencer? 😉