Thursday 12 January 2017

Mercure - Helping Solidify My Love Of Manchester


I think I've always had a little bit of a city crush on Manchester.

Even way back, when I was a young, Year 8 Middle School student I seemed to have a lure towards the place.

I remember the whole sporting obsessions of my friends revolved around the then top of the league Liverpool, yet myself - despite not being a football fan at all - for some reason I went totally against the grain and Manchester United was my club of choice.

And then years (and years) later when I actually ventured into the city itself (I gatecrashed my Hubby's work call out one day - he went to work whilst I mingled amongst the rails in Primark - romantic eh!) I instantly loved the place - there was even a time where I was really eager to up sticks and move our family there.

So when we were asked to take a Manchester bound trip just before Christmas to be wined, dined and looked after by the lovely people at Mercure Manchester Piccadilly can you imagine me saying "No"?

Obviously not.

And so the day rolled by, we packed up the car (a family of four with a small human does not pack light trust me) and set off on our Christmas travels.

As soon as we arrived at the hotel and were all checked in we were made to feel really comfortable, at ease and very well looked after.

~ Willow found a huge Christmas tree to get all excited over...


~ Our room for the evening was fabulous and even my picky/fussy self was impressed...




...it was spacious, comfortable, very clean and had everything we could possibly need...


What more could we ask for?

Well - yummy cake wouldn't go a-miss...



...and a few bubbles perhaps...
(delivered direct to our room door no less!)


Mercure certainly had it all covered and I felt a little like royalty I must admit.
(yeah, yeah, I don't get out much these days I know - but it was an amazingly lovely, start-the-stay-off-perfect little touch)



And the treats didn't stop there either - we had a "Gathering Of The Bloggers" where more nibbles and beverages were served whilst looking out onto the fabulous city view...


...before being given a tour of the hotel, allowing us to fully appreciate all of the things it has on offer for it's guests.

My son was quite taken with the gym...


...and I have to admit that the swanky Christmas party we watched being set up for had me half wishing I had packed a fancy frock so I could try my chances at a bit of gatecrashing later that evening...


I mean just look at the size of that room...


I'd like to bet there were more than a few sore heads the day after that shindig.

Now carrying a wriggly baby around a hotel with her changing bag (that simply has to come everywhere with us) slung over one arm may not have been the easiest of tasks to carry out but it was made so much better by the lovely staff members I met on our floor-to-floor travels - each one helped me so much, be it by holding a door for me or opening up a locked room for me to use.

After all, it sometimes is the smallest of things which really make all of the difference.

Our group parted ways shortly after this and as a family we headed out, across Manchester to visit the Winter Wonderland...



Having such a large age gap between kiddies is fab most of the time however we have found that events such as this one tend to have things which are too old or too overwhelming for our fourteen month old, yet are too young and not engaging enough for our eleven year old.

It's a hard balance to find and the Winter Wonderland, whilst it was large and Christmas-packed, just made us want to be back in the cosiness of our hotel room so, fairly quickly, we hotfooted it back "home"...

...plus we all really wanted some lovely food, so Mercure it was.

However, us being us we even managed to hit a slight issue when it came to our food eating.

Willow decided that she really needed to go to bed about forty-five minutes before we were due to hit the restaurant (don't worry we fed her hours earlier) and what Willow wants, Willow gets.

So she enjoyed a lovely, warm Mercure bubbly bath and then settled down into the travel cot we found so kindly set up for us and the boys headed down to the restaurant for their three course meal.

But what about Mum's empty tummy?

Well Mercue were amazing actually - they took my food order and despite none of it being on the room service menu a lovely lady brought everything up to my room, complete with a drink too...


I mean, yes I didn't have the fab company of our group but I sat, sleeping baby settled and peaceful behind me and enjoyed some rather tasty grub...

~ A classic prawn salad starter...


~ A hearty potato topped pie with vegetables for the main course...


...and...

~ yummy treacle sponge with ice-cream for pudding...


I enjoyed everything and the only fault I could find was that my sponge pudding was quite cold by the time I managed to eat it...but that's down to my slow eating and no fault of anyone.

After a peaceful, very comfortable nights sleep, Willow woke us at 5am (nothing unusual there!) and had a very fun morning bouncing a ball across the tiled bathroom floor for hours (and hours...) which meant that we were first down to breakfast at 8am and managed to get there before the doors were even open...


The food choices were fantastic and plentiful...

~ cereals
~ toast
~ pastries
~ a full cooked breakfast

...a real, hearty feast...

...which I didn't manage to take a single photograph of - total fail I know - due to the little lady turning into a breakfast avoiding diva at the table and wanting to leave - something I put down to her very early start.

Mercure - who have some brilliant Winter deals on right now - managed to secure my love of Manchester even more and I had a wonderful experience with them.

I'm sure I shall be back again...hopefully sometime soon.

Make sure you #ExperienceMercure if you have the chance


* stay provided free of charge - all words, pictures & opinions 100% my own
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