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Hotel Review: Copenhagen Admiral Hotel, Copenhagen, Denmark

 

Last month on our wonderful winter city break to beautiful Copenhagen, my sister and I had the chance to stay at the fantastic Copenhagen Admiral hotel, right at the heart of the city just around the corner from the picturesque Nyhavn Harbour. We stayed on a room-only basis for three nights and had the most amazing stay. The historic building is a converted 18th century warehouse and everything from the waterfront location to the nautical themed décor, comfortable beds and welcoming staff made our stay truly brilliant. If you’re looking for a place to stay on your next trip to the Danish capital here’s why the Copenhagen Admiral is an absolute must…

 

The Location

 

 

Location is so important to me when booking accommodation for my city breaks, especially as I only have a few days for the trip and I like to be close to everything so I can make the most of my short break away. For me, the location of the Admiral hotel was perfect; situated on the Toldbodgade street right in the heart of the city, just around the corner from Nyhavn and right on the waterfront overlooking Paper Island. Amalienborg Palace was just a few steps away, whilst The Little Mermaid and Kastallet Fortress were a 20 minute stroll away along the waterfront, and Rosenborg Castle, The Round Tower and Christiansborg Palace were also a 20 minute stroll away, but in the opposite direction. The nearest metro stop, Kongens Nytorv, was just 5-10 minutes away allowing easy access to the airport and train stations.

 

The Room

 

 

I think my favourite thing about this hotel was our gorgeous, cosy room! The wooden beams really added to the charm and made it so authentic, whilst the desk/sofa area gave us an added sense of space. The bathroom with power shower was a godsend after a long days walking in the cold and there was plenty of wardrobe space too. The beds, and pillows, were super comfy and we both had an excellent sleep every single night.

 

The Facilities

 

 

The bar and reception area were spotlessly clean, modern and spacious with plenty of luggage area, large elevators and space to relax. The reception staff were so efficient, there were next to no queues and all our requests were dealt with very quickly. We didn’t dine in the restaurant area so I cannot comment on breakfast, lunch or dinner but I have heard wonderful reviews about the onsite SALT restaurant. We had a couple of drinks in the bar one night which was really enjoyable; the prices were expensive, but I would expect this from a 4* hotel bar, and the atmosphere was lovely, very relaxed and friendly. We decided to book an hour in the wellness centre one night to warm ourselves up after a cold day of exploring, and it was so nice to have it to ourselves and spend some time totally relaxing. The wellness centre, with sauna, steam room and power shower, can be booked for an hour free of charge and you will have the whole place to yourself – worth doing if you want some well deserved ME time!

 

The Verdict

 

 

Overall we had a fantastic stay at the Copenhagen Admiral and I would highly recommend staying here on a mid-week or weekend visit for a cosy and comfortable stay in the heart of the city. Every aspect from the brilliant location to the nautical sea theme and the charming room made our stay such a pleasant one; the staff made us feel so welcome throughout the whole of our stay, from the minute we arrived at check in, to the second we checked out, nothing was too much trouble.

So there we have it, my full review of the wonderful Copenhagen Admiral. I cannot recommend this hotel highly enough for those looking for a stylish and comfortable stay in the heart of the city – thank you to the lovely staff for making our stay such a pleasant one! For more information or to book a room please visit their website directly.

 

 

NB. I received a small discount in exchange for providing an honest review of the Copenhagen Admiral Hotel and, as always, all thoughts are my own.

NB. Featured photo: image credit -Copenhagen Admiral Hotel website

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February Newsletter

 

⛴⛴ #Liverpool #titanic #takemeback

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Hi everyone,

With January being a ridiculously long month I always forget that February is a super short month and therefore March comes around so so quickly! It only seems like yesterday since I wrote my January Newsletter, and my highlight of this month was my first overseas adventure of 2017 which was pretty amazing! Here’s what I’ve been up to over the past few weeks…

I started planning my European adventures

 

 

Now that January is out the way, February gave me a chance to really plan my adventures for 2017 and have a good think about where I want to go, and what I want to do. I’m still not entirely sure, and I’ve been mulling it over for weeks now, as you’ll know if you read one of my recent posts. I have however decided to book another trip and am sooo excited to announce that I’ll be heading to Bratislava and Vienna at the end of March with my lovely friend and fellow travel blogger Lucy from Faraway Lucy! We’re flying in to Bratislava, staying there for two nights and are then catching the train to Vienna for two nights before flying back from Bratislava to the UK on 1st April. We’re both super excited and can’t wait for our first adventure together… send us all your recommendations for Bratislava and Vienna please guys!

I was featured in IceLolly.com’s new campaign

 

 

If you follow me on Instagram you’ll notice that I recently posted a few throwback photos from some of my previous trips to Zakynthos and Paphos for a new campaign that holiday comparison site IceLolly were running throughout February. The campaign was called #IceLollyLoves and I posted a series of photos from destinations I completely fell in love with the first time I visited them, and I chose Zakynthos and Paphos, but focused on Paphos for the purpose of the article that IceLolly had put together. I really loved taking part in this campaign as it reminded me how much I love exploring beach destinations, something I haven’t done for the past three years whilst I have been city-breaking my way across the world! I’m off to Tenerife in May though and can’t wait for some proper sunshine and a full week of relaxation! You can read the article that IceLolly put together here – my contribution for Paphos is top of the list!

I took a social media detox

 

 

A couple of weeks ago I was feeling a little down after having a few bad days in a row. It may have been something to do with the fact that it was Valentines Day and I was feeling even more single and lonely than I usually do, but something in me was just feeling really unhappy and I knew I had to do something about it. So, on Valentines Day, I decided to take myself off social media completely for the whole day and just remove myself from what was becoming quite a toxic online environment. I don’t want to see what presents people have bought each other on the most commercialised day of the year. I spend my days browsing Facebook seeing that couples are getting engaged, moving in together and having babies, and I always wonder why it’s not me living those dreams, and why it’s always somebody else instead.

I know I’m not ready for those things yet, and I love travelling as much as I can and just enjoying myself, but deep down, I find it hard to accept that I haven’t quite got my life together yet. Anyway, I took myself off social media to try and remove any negativity and, you know what, it really helped. It just made me realise that looking at other peoples lives and comparing mine to theirs isn’t doing me any good at all, and it made me realise I just need to concentrate on what I have got, not what I haven’t got. Social media is a massive part of my job, and my blog, but I’ve decided to cut down on how much I use it in my personal life, and I think that’ll have a big impact upon the way I see things going forwards. I’ll be cutting down a lot over the next few weeks so I’ll report back in a couple of months time and update you then!

I went to Copenhagen for the weekend

 

Been in #Copenhagen for less than four hours and I'm already in love! This place is so beautiful 😍😍 #visitcopenhagen

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If you’re following me on social media you’ll know that I recently went on my first overseas trip to the Danish capital of Copenhagen and I had the most wonderful time! I travelled with my sister and we spent four days indulging in scrummy Danish pastries, people watching at the beautiful Nyhavn Harbour and exploring the stunning Christansborg Palace and Rosenborg Castle on foot. We wandered down the Stroget, the largest pedestrianized shopping street in Europe, climbed up the Round Tower for spectacular views of the city below and trekked along the waterfront to see the iconic Little Mermaid statue. We also found the time to cross the Oresund Bridge over to Sweden and had a day out at Malmo as well, ticking off another country along the way! We had a wonderful trip and I can’t wait to share my full guide with you soon… watch this space!

 

I reviewed another wonderful hotel in the Cotswolds 

 

Just another hotel review 🏨🏨🍾🍾 #standardmonday #luxlife #ionlygetoutofbedforchampagne

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Last night I was staying in the pretty Cotswolds town of Watlington where I had the pleasure of reviewing The Fat Fox Inn, a beautiful country pub with 9 en-suite rooms perfectly located between Oxford and the Chiltern Hills. I stayed with my best friend and number 1 travel companion Emily who comes with me on all of my review trips – it’s a hard life isn’t it! We had a lovely stay and enjoyed a fantastic dinner, a cosy night’s sleep and a scrummy breakfast before heading to Oxford today for a day of shopping and lunching. I’ll be posting a full review and blog post in a couple of week’s time, so watch this space…Thank you to The Fat Fox for having us!

So there we go, that’s how my February turned out! Did you have a good month? Let me know what you got up to – it would be great to hear from you!

Love Jess x

 

Watch and you'll see, someday I'll be part of your world 🐚🐚 #Copenhagen #thelittlemermaid #ifoundariel

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November Newsletter

Hi everyone,

It’s that time of the month again, and my jam-packed newsletter is here! As November is a five week month it’s felt like ages since I wrote my last newsletter, but I have crammed so much into these past few weeks and am so excited to tell you all what I’ve been up to! Here goes…

I celebrated Bonfire Night

 

My favourite time of year 💥🎉😍🍂 #bonfirenight #fireworks #autumn

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Bonfire Night is undoubtedly my favourite time of the year, I just LOVE it! I love wrapping up warm, grabbing a sparkler and gazing towards the skies as they light up with firework after firework. The food is a winner too, who doesn’t love tucking into a  hot dog (or three) whilst watching the fireworks go off?! I was lucky enough to go to TWO local displays this year and they were both wonderful.

I watched Ghost the Musical on stage

Musicals are soooo my thing, I love everything about them and am attempting to see as many as I can over the next few years! This year I’ve already seen The Bodyguard, Chicago and Les Mis, so watching Ghost was my final show of 2016 and what a show it was. Every single element from the cast to the music to the performance was mesmerising; I cried like a baby at the end but I loved every minute of it! Congratulations to the fantastic cast, crew and production company for putting on SUCH an amazing show.

I attended WTM London for the first time

 

 

I was sooo excited to attend my first conference at WTM London this year and couldn’t wait to start rubbing shoulders with brands, tourism boards and fellow bloggers at the biggest travel trade show in the world. I met so many people and learnt so much in such a short amount of time, one day definitely wasn’t enough to take everything in. Read all about my amazing time at London’s ExCel Centre here – I already can’t wait to return in 2017!

I won FREE return flights with Jet2.com

 

 

So anyone that knows me will know that I have really BAD luck at winning things. I never win on scratch cards, on lottery tickets or at any competition at all, until this month when I was one of 20,000 lucky people who won FREE return flights with Jet2.com’s  Name It competition! I was sooo overwhelmed I couldn’t believe it! I have the choice of visiting over 58 of Jet2’s fab European destinations in summer 2017 and I need to pick my holiday destination by 16th December, so I don’t have long! At the moment I’m torn between a cheeky week in Tenerife, or a little city break to either Dubrovnik, Geneva or Warsaw – people of WordPress… HELP ME CHOOSE! I might run a Twitter poll because I genuinely can’t decide.. watch this space…

I visited London three times in space of 7 days

 

 

It’s no secret how much I love London, and I was delighted when I recently got the chance to visit the city three times in the same week. I did some sightseeing on the Southbank, some wandering around Winter Wonderland and accidentally stumbled upon the UK premier of Fantastic Beasts in the middle of Leicester Square! London is looking particularly beautiful now that all the Christmas lights are up, and I just love the city at this time of year.

I entered Accor Hotels latest competition

 

 

I found this competition after scrolling past something on Twitter but I was also emailed directly about it and was invited to enter before the deadline closed, so thought I would get my entry in nice and quickly! AccorHotels is inviting bloggers to share their top tips on how to spend 24hrs in their fave cities. Naturally, I chose to write about the Big Apple as I literally had just 24hrs there before I had to jet back to sunny London the day after Independence Day! The prize is an incredible 9 night stay in Berlin, Amsterdam and Paris which, for me, would be my total dream trip so I’m keeping everything crossed that I may have a teeny tiny chance of winning. Have a read of my entry – and GOOD LUCK to all other bloggers entering, don’t forget to use the dedicated hashtag #AccorHotels24Hrs

I spent a festive day at Winter Wonderland

 

 

If you follow me on Instagram you’ll know I’ve been to Winter Wonderland recently as my feed is FULL of festive images from my day out there a couple of weeks ago. London’s Winter Wonderland at Hyde Park is celebrating it’s 10th anniversary this year, and my fourth annual visit to the wintry spectacle certainly didn’t disappoint! I had a wonderful time and already can’t wait to return next Christmas (am I really thinking about next Christmas already?! Time – Please. Stop. Going. So. FAST!!

I reviewed a lovely hotel at the heart of the Cotswolds

 

Another day, another hotel review! Wonderful stay in the heart of the #Cotswolds – full review and blog post coming soon! #Oxfordshire

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Last weekend I had the pleasure of staying in one of the cosiest Cotswolds retreats, The White Horse Inn at Duns Tew. I was reviewing the Inn on behalf of a PR company and had a wonderful time. The staff made us feel so welcome, the room was sooo nice and cosy, and the dinner and breakfasts the next morning were AMAZING! The White Horse Inn was such as lovely location to spend my last weekend in November, and I would whole-heartedly recommend it to those looking for the ultimate getaway at the heart of the Cotswolds. Full review and blog post coming soon!

So there we go, I told you I’d had a busy month! It seems like November has gone by nice and slowly, and has given me chance to catch my breath after my hectic summer and busy autumn. I can’t quite believe we are about to enter our final month of 2016 though, where the HELL has this past year gone?! I’m in full festive mode now, I’m halfway through my Christmas shopping and I’m looking forward to the big day. Have you got yourself prepared for Christmas yet? Are you spending the festive period away from home? Tell me all your plans!

Love Jess x

 

Unexpectedly #London bound… Again! ✨💃 #selfie #happytuesday #backtomyfavecity

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10 InstaPics That Will Make You Want To Visit London's Winter Wonderland On Its 10th Anniversary This Christmas

Hey everyone,

So I know we’re still in November, but I have been feeling ever so festive lately, mainly because I took a trip to London’s Winter Wonderland last weekend! I went with my two sisters and two of my cousins and we had a wonderfully festive day out at the Hyde Park Christmas fair. In my opinion, it’s never too early to get in the Christmas spirit, and with the festival’s 10th year anniversary celebrations in full swing, here are 10 of my favourite photos from the day proving why you should visit Winter Wonderland this Christmas!

#1 The Carousel

Winter Wonderland 🌲🎅☃✨

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Just look at it. The inner child in me is just raring to get on that thing, it’s the ultimate fair ground ride, and there’s a giant Christmas tree right next to it. I. Am. SOLD.

#2 The Sparkly Lights

 

The park looks pretty amazing during the day time, but it looks truly spectacular after dark when the millions of lights are turned on and the park truly glitters in the night sky. Just LOOK at those lights!

#3 The Markets

 

It’s no secret that Winter Wonderland is brimming with Christmas markets selling everything from candles and soaps to handmade jewellery and wood carved ornaments. Wander round the market stalls, soak up the festive atmosphere and bag some unique gifts from these traditional German style wooden huts.

#4 The Rides

 

The rides are just amazing, from tiny spinning tea cups for the kids to giant rollercoasters for the thrill seeking adults and every kind of ride you can think of packed in between, there’s something for every rider and the queues are well worth the wait!

*TIP* To beat the queues go o on a week-day, not a weekend, and ride in the morning/early afternoon instead of the evening.

#5 The Food Stalls

🌲🌲

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There are hundreds of food stalls stocking everything from burgers and chips to German Bratwurst (sausage), roasted chestnuts, chocolate waffles and as many pick n mix sweets as you can manage! The Bavarian Village is a great place to escape the cold and relax for an hour, whilst the Carousel Bars (yes, really) are super cool, just be prepared to stand up while you waltz!

#6 The Special Attractions

 

Although entrance to the park is free, there are a number of additional attractions which are charged separately. I’d recommend booking online to guarantee your time slot, especially as the park will get busier in the lead up to December. The attractions include a Magical Ice Kingdom, Zippos Christmas Circus and a special showing of The Nutcracker on Ice.

#7 The Games Stands

German markets, giant towers and scary rollercoasters… It could only be winter wonderland! 🎅🌲 #London #visitlondon #winterwonderland

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There may be fairground rides aplenty, but there’s also tonnes of games stands to be found whilst wandering round the park. Try your hand at a game of hook-a-duck, mini-basketball or take on the shooting-gallery to be in with the chance of bagging a special Winter Wonderland prize!

#8 The Ice Rink

 

Is there anything more romantic than gliding across the ice and soaking up the festive atmosphere? I doubt it. But, this only applies if you don’t fall over. And end up looking like a total fool in front of all the ogling spectators. Don’t do it if you can’t skate! Only joking, it’s all good fun, and it’ll warm you up if you’re cold – you will sweat SO FRIKKIN MUCH!

#9 The Ferris Wheel

 

Just like The London Eye, but not as expensive, the ferris wheel at Winter Wonderland is one of the absolute must do’s. You’ll soar high into the sky and rotate slowly, enabling you to take in the most spectacular panoramic views of the park, and the rest of London too. I’d recommend taking your ‘flight’ once the sun goes down, as the park looks sooo much more impressive from above after dark, when everything is lit up!

#10 The Selfie Opportunities

Christmassy little day with my gorgeous family 🎅🌲☃🌟🎡 #winterwonderland #london #girlsgirlsgirls

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There are SO many places to take great selfies and you’ll be totally spoilt for choice, but we loved this polar bear/ ice cliff/waterfall sculpture and took our favourite photo of the day right in that very spot!

Have YOU visited Winter Wonderland yet? If not, what are you waiting for?! It its totally FREE to enter, and the park is open from 10am-10pm every day until 2nd January 2017. Go go go!

Love Jess x

 

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Oxford Christmas Market

 

Hi everyone,

I’m starting to feel really Christmassy now after my recent visit to Disneyland Paris – blog post to follow!! – I had such a fantastic time; everything was sooo magical and sparkly I just didn’t want to leave! To continue with my festivities now that I’m back home I decided to head over to Oxford this weekend to discover their beautiful Christmas markets…

fairylightcompany         christmas markets

Located on historic Broad Street in the heart of the city, the Oxford Christmas Market has welcomed thousands of visitors to their eye-catching stalls for the past three years running. This year, the event promised to be bigger than ever with a record 50 stalls selling festive gifts, foodie treats and Christmas decorations.

I attended yesterday with my mum and sister and we wandered around the markets looking for lots of goodies to snap up! I usually find the prices of Christmas Markets extortionate, and I expected them to be high as we were in Oxford, but I was pleasantly surprised that they weren’t as expensive as I had thought! Hotdogs and burgers were around the £5 mark and handmade Christmas tree decorations started from just £2 each – bargain!

Our buy of the day was a box of the fantastic Schoko Kuss, a traditional German delicacy of fluffy creamy marshmallow on a waffle base smothered in heaps of chocolate. There were over 10 flavours to choose from including After Eight, Baileys, Coconut and Caramel… are you drooling yet?! I know we were! So much so that we bought a WHOLE BOX of them and devoured them later on that evening! A box of 12 cost a reasonable ten pounds and they were worth EVERY penny.

schoko kuss

The markets run until 20th December from 10am-8pm Thursday-Saturday and until 7pm Sunday-Wednesday so make sure you visit before they close! With musical performances throughout the day, from jazz singers to school choirs, you’ll love everything about the beautiful Christmas Market and will come away feeling ever so festive.. I dare you not to embrace the Christmas spirit!

Love Jess x

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