Manchester City And The Epic Game That Made It All Worth It!

 Manchester City was just "ok" in our opinion. It served as a good place to decompress from the past week of non-stop action. There was definitely some cool architecture though...

 

We stopped by the National Football Museum which was worth the visit. 

We also stumbled upon an indoor Cricket batting cage and you know us...we almost NEVER turn down a batting cage!

The highlight of our time in Manchester was the Manchester City vs. Aston Villa premiere league game. From the moment we stepped on the tram to get to the game, you could feel the excitement!

 

Helmut bought the tickets back in January. He made a guess as to which game would be the most exciting and he totally nailed it! If Man City won this game, they would win the whole thing!

Before the game we met a guy while waiting in line. He was clearly a former hooligan. He even had a tattoo across his arm that said  93:20, which is a reference to a historic goal made in 2012 and is a part of the teams lore. He said he came all the way from Dover to see the game and has been a fan his whole life. He also had a tongue ring. I'm not sure why I felt like I needed to mention that, but it definitely feels relevant as to why we felt this guy belonged in the "Hooligan" category. He was cool, and VERY passionate about Man City!

The Aston Villa fans were VERY vocal, and VERY cocky...

Here is Helmut's recap of the action:

"Dramatic! First place Man City was done, down 2-0 to Aston Villa. Looking at dropping to 2nd place in the league. The Premier League title was going to Liverpool on the last game of the season. Then, at the 76th minute, Man City score, now 2-1, momentum swing, fans losing it, absolutely nuts! Aston Villa fans had been antagonizing City fans for 75 minutes. City brings in subs that make a huge difference and within five minutes, the score is 3-2 for Man City. The turnaround was mind blowing, emotion like I’ve never seen at any game/match. In the end, City killed off the next 12-ish minutes and win the Premier League. And then the pitch invasion ensues, bedlam!"

 

 

 

This game was off the chain! We can't believe we got to see a legit pitch invasion!

 

 

A Little Bit of Liverpool

While trying to book our train ticket from London to Manchester, we realized that the prices were cheaper from London to Liverpool. A difference of about £35. That gave us the idea of going early and spending the day there since tickets from Liverpool to Manchester were crazy cheap. We planned to see The Beatles Story Museum and get a tour of the famous Liverpool soccer venue Anfield. 

Anfield was also on the 2for2 DaysOut list, so even better!

One of the caveats of the deal is that you must get your tickets from a national rail station so we decided to book these tickets on our way through Stafford Station while passing through to go to the Westham game. 

 

Let this be a lesson to anyone booking train tickets in the UK…the closer you get to the date of your trip, the higher the price can go. When we tried to book our tickets, they went from something like £ 37 for the early train we planned to take to over £ 100! We ended up having to take a later train and not do anything else except the Anfield Tour. This actually worked out because we were able to check out of our Air BNB at a leisurely pace.

 

We got up to Liverpool at about 12:30pm and planned on leaving our bags at the train station. We heard there was a stall at the station where you can leave your luggage. 

Our mistake for not looking at exactly how much it costs to do this, because it was ridiculously expensive. It was not that bad if you wanted to leave your bags for only 3 hours, but the next option was a price for up to 24 hours. We only needed 6. By the time we realized all this it was too late, there was no option but to just do it. We pack light, but they charged by the bag and we had 4. UGH! Another lesson learned!

 

Liverpool

 

We had lunch and then took an Uber to the stadium. 

The Uber driver was a crackup and taught us the proper way to say “Wanker”. He also turned us on to other colorful British words such as “Gobshite” and “Knob”.  

Touring Anfield was like bucket list status stuff for Helmut.

 

He’s a huge fan of the sport and we found the tour interesting, but felt that most of the inside lacked character. The field, however, was AWSOME!

 

 

Our tour guide told us that the grass was 97 percent real grass and 3% plastic astroturf. 

We got to sit in the area called the “Kop” which apparently means hill. This is the area where all the super fans sit and the field was at eye level. 

Our tickets also got us into a museum where we could go see all the key moments in the team’s history and all the cups they’ve won. 

 

 

The whole thing took less than 2 hours and before we knew it, we were back at Lime street station to catch our train to Manchester. 

 

 

 

It’s a shame that we couldn’t stay longer, but the city looked like a place we would definitely want to return to someday.

Goodbye London…We’ll be back!

Overall, London was a success! 

In addition to all the museums and plays, we saw West Ham vs Man City play at London Stadium, which was a blast! 

The best part was the fans. They were totally no nonsense. I accidentally snapped this picture, but really like how it turned out because it is a perfect representation of the fans and their undying love for their team. Look at those faces!

They were constantly singing songs and shouting things like “you’re useless!”, and chanting, “The Referee’s a Wanker!”

The game was an important one and ended up in a tie. We have another game lined up in Manchester, and that one should be even more exciting!

We also went to the London Mithreum, which is a museum of the ruins of a Roman temple built around  240AD. The museum was free which is good because we were really disappointed in this one. Not worth spending the time unless you have nothing better to do. 

While we were wandering around looking for stuff do do, we went to the Leadenhall Market and the Borough Market.

Leadenhall looked neat, but was really nothing more than your typical mall so we didn’t stay long.

Borough Market was really interesting and we wished we had found it sooner. It was filled with stalls selling spices and food from all over the world. 

We were sad that we couldn’t buy anything because we were going to a show that night and didn’t have anywhere to put anything (the venue said no bags). 

We will definitely put this at the top of our list for next time though.

Here are a few pictures from when we were just wandering around the city:

The HMS Belfast with London Bridge in the background

Helmut sleeping on the ferry

Our next stop is Manchester with a quick day trip to Liverpool on the way.