One of my uni friends lives up in Newcastle, so my other uni friend and I decided to visit her and have a little weekend away. I was a very shitty blogger and forgot to take good pictures, so you’ll have to forgive me, use your imagintation and deal with these…

We arrived on the Friday afternoon and spent the evening eating our bodyweight in snacks whilst bingeing the new series of Love is Blind.

We woke up in the morning to have a lazy breakfast before heading over to Tynemouth market. Literally in the Tynemouth metro station, this market sets up at the weekend and has stalls selling anything and everything you can think of. Handmade jewellery, vinyl records, crystals, some questionable WW2 memorabilia and of course, food. We got the mac&cheese and a tartiflette from Cheese Sir. It was the perfect accompaniment for a stroll to and across the beach.

Long Sands beach isn’t exactly the Caribbean sea but, surprisingly, has some proper nice golden sand. I can imagine, (and have been told), it’s lush in the summer. It definitely wasn’t get a bikini on and sunbathe weather, but it was just calming to be so close to the waves. There were a good few people out walking their dogs. There were even some people doing water sports: every cred to them.

We made a pit stop at The View which is a restaurant at one end of the beach, to escape the wind and grab a coffee, before heading back home to chill and get ready for dinner.

Dinner was at Dabbawal in Jesmond, (one of the posho sides of Newcastle). We arrived to what looks like a weird alley way but the pink neon sign invited us in to a bustling restaurant. We ordered the chef’s surprise menu and made sure to say we were pescatarian. We were brought out poppadoms, sweet potato chat, (increds!), bhel puri, and a starter of salmon and paneer. For mains we were given a serious spread: a prawn curry, a lentil curry and a veggie curry to share with steamed rice, pulao rice, naans and a veggie side dish. Everything was absolutely delicious and the portions are very generous – we actually didn’t manage to finish everything! Our food was washed down with some great cocktails. The chefs surprise is £26.50 each. With 2 cocktails on top, our total per person came to £48. I would say that walking in for dinner and the weekend would be difficult so it’s probably best to book.

Too full to really move, we rolled out of dinner and headed back to watch Rush Hour before hitting the hay – hearts and bellies full.