A year ago I had a fabulous, fabulous weekend… to Manchester to see the Mavericks with my good friends Hannah and Jenna, then the next day to Birmingham… to see the Mavericks, with Hannah and Jenna!
Here is what I wrote:
I always think of Manchester as ‘my’ town; I moved there when I was eighteen, and although I subsequently moved to Oldham, I was still at heart a Mancunian. Now I live in the south-west… so when people say where am I from I never know whether to say Cambridge where I was born, Manchester which took my heart, Oldham where I lived for nearly twenty years, or Uphill where I am now…
I went to Manchester last week to see the Mavericks, and two friends came with me and I was so delighted that the city looked absolutely splendid. We had a wonderful time and a memorable time, partly because of Manchester.
My friends posing by what I presume is a canal basin by the Bridgwater Hall
There is a first class tram service, quick, cheap, efficient… and clean! Nothing worse than trying to show off a place you love and it lets itself down with grubby poor transport. A lot of buildings had disappeared since I was there… and a lot of them were not of any architectural or historic merit but often badly built, tatty and shabby… not what could be said of the marvellous new architecture in the city centre.
Not every old place has been pulled down – this delightful little pub used to be quite shabby and not somewhere I fancied visiting… Look how smart it is now…
…. while still retaining its quaint old features. Peveril of the Peak is named after a horse-drawn stage-coach that ran from Manchester to London. There is also a novel by Sir Walter Scott of the same name. It was built in the early 1800’s and the beautiful tiles were put on in 1900. It sells Wilson’s., a fine beer!
The old Central Station… now a venue for conferences and concerts. It was opened as a station in 1880 and closed in 1969.
These beautiful buildings tell of Manchester’s industrial heritage, factories or warehouses, I’m not sure, but fortunes were made… probably off the backs of the workers
Typical Manchester back alley
Mancunian humour… Manchipster Plaice! Guess what it sells!
Which way to the Mavericks, Mr Gladstone? “That way!”
Lois Elsden 