Manchester : Lively city with plenty of bars & restaurants

Well many people would be surprised of what Manchester has to offer, it's not all about football and rough areas, it's a city with a big contrast between modern and old English architecture. It's very mixed with different nationalities, people wear and do what they want and nobody cares and they live together, sometimes it was even hard to see British people around! I loved their hairstyles, so different! Same about their clothing style , very edgy and different,not everybody cup of tea but i found it so 80ies/70 ies, they are like in another era!. I wish i could have had a long conversation with one of the locals about the city but we could not understand a word when they were talking, same there when we talked they could not understand us either lol I think we are ready to go to Liverpool now (another city with a tough accent to understand!). We got many recommendations from people of bars & restaurants to go to and areas like : Castlefield with its canals dating form the Roman era where all the city of Manchester started. This is was my fab part, just before getting there you could see the big tall Hilton tower where there is a bar on the top, again my vertigo did not let me go in there, anyway i would not pay 20 pounds for a cocktail there thanx. It was beautiful to see the contrast of the Hilton tower with the Roman architecture. There were many nice terrace bars along the canal where you could have grilled food and/or a drink (I recommend " a daiquiri" o "pi~na colada") , our fav place is called: "Bohemia Bar & grill", which is very busy over the weekend but it's worth waiting. Yeah there were cafeterias & grill bars everywhere and I love grills and coffee!! They also put almonds and olives in most of the bars we went to, i felt like home!! They were really tasty and it was loud inside bars, yeah people talking loud very loud! I loved that! There were restaurants from all around the world, probably due to its multiculturalism.

Our hotel was located only 5 mins away from the station on London road, ideal location just minutes away from piccadilly gardens (centre),it's called "Mc Donald Manchester", Chinatown (a bit smelly place but interesting,anyway), the gay quarter (ideal to have a fun crazy night with all sort of people in shapes and colours lol) and a bit further the beautiful Townhall, National Gallery (St Peter's square) ,the shopping area on Market street, the cathedral and Printworks (go inside, i almost miss it!). A bit further away is Castlefield, you can get there by tram or even on foot (30 mins from piccadilly station / return ticket 2,60 pounds) where you can find the canals & bars i talked about and also the Science museum (free entry). If you are into modern architecture and art, you should go to Harbour city by tram and get to Media city, this part was the most modern of them all (it reminded me of the Docklands area in Dublin) and it also has the Lowry art galley with a theatre,cinema and library (We were lucky to see an Andy Warhol exhibition called "The divas", fab! i totally recommend it for Warhol's lovers like me!). Crossing the river you have the Manchester United stadium and the Imperial war museum. As you can see , you will not get bored in Manchester. Yeah there are rough areas in the city but you don't need to go there as a tourist and yeah it's not the cleanest of the cities (specially piccadilly garden..) but it has other things you can't imagine. We stayed there for 3 nights and we had a great time, i recommend it for a weekend break,maybe not to study English ..but for a break, yeah!!! and remember they have pounds so nothing is cheap..you need a good budget! And yeah ,we could not find the tv set for Shameless but we saw a couple who looked like the protagonist of the famous t.v. serie lol

Last but not least i wanted to leave you with some recommendations we got in case they are useful to you:

Nice places
Room(great cocktails)-top of king street
Grinch –great lunch
Northern Quarter bars
Canal Street-Velvet (gay area)

Deansgate
Goucho Grill(behind Kendals)
Living Room
Hilton Tower –cloud 23
Panache
Good atmosphere
LAVA bar
Cocktail bar at Selfridges


Science Museum
Coronation street set


Triangle –shops
Shoes Moda en Pelle for girls


AVOID :
Deansgate locks
Printworks
Market Street-pickpockets