Bristol An almost finished city 4/501

Continuing my charity work that consists of taxiing people back and forth from university, I took a small (50 mile) detour on the way to Cardiff to have a pit stop in Bristol. Purely so I can tick it off the list of cities I have visited.

I wasn't expecting much, as the last time I had been there all I can remember is sat on the motorway in the biggest tailback ever on the way to a holiday in Devon. When mentioning it in passing to other people no one else seemed particularly enthused about the place either. All everyone seemed to know was that it is impossible to park there.

As we only had a few hours I deployed my usual tactic of walking as fast and as far as possible. Perhaps going on a Sunday wasn't the best plan I have ever had, as quite a few places were closed. The town centre was fairly unremarkable, could easily have been confused with Swansea or Worcester. But once we got passed the generic shops and Starbucks things looked up.

We found the cathedral was encircled by a huge Sikh festival that was obviously gearing up for opening later on the day. Quite a surreal site, this huge cold Christian landmark surrounded by Bangra music, brightly coloured lanterns and the smell of spicy food. Was quite chuffed that we were allowed to wander around the cathedral for free, as the little tiny one in Chester charges, so we went and looked at the stained glass windows, got bored, and moved on.

Leading the way like I knew where I was going (as usual) we found a new development next to the river. It was still largely empty, had lots of signs about with 'coming soon' and 'to let' in the windows.  There are wide open squares, reminiscent of Berlin and it is right next to the river so there are some beautiful views. And to top it off there is a huge screen in the square that was showing the F1 at the time.

I think that if we went back the same time next year (perhaps not on a Sunday) the place would be amazing. As it is at the moment there is the riverside and its ice cream parlours and coffee shops, which is lovely. But give it a year and it might be even better than Cardiff Bay.

Because of our complete lack of pictures. (do you have some Neff?) I leave you with Bang as Neff did an amazing air drumming solo in the car just as we got to the city centre - if you ever get a chance, ask her to recreate it. She is up their with Animal on the charts of best air drummers ever!