Brighton

One of my favourite things about living in London is the great day trip we can take to other parts of England. For Christmas last year, my mom bought me this great Frommer’s book on the “25 Best Day Trips from London” that we’re slowly but surely making our way through.

Last week, we enjoyed an unprecedented 7 straight sunny days in London. For a people who hadn’t seen sunlight for nearly 5 months, this was AMAZING. Wanting to fully take advantage of this weather, bobby and I decided to take a day trip down to the seaside town of Brighton.

Today, Brighton is famous not only for its beach, but for its young, fun, Bohemian scene. It originally became popular in the early 1800s when the King Regent George the IV made it his vacation home. There he built the Royal Pavilion.

Royal Pavilion, Brighton

Modern day Brightoners hate this former royal palace. Inspired by Indian architectural style, it is like no other palace I have seen in Europe. Unlike the townsfolk, I actually thought it was quite pretty from the outside. Once you enter the Palace, however, it’s like you’ve enter Chinatown. It turns out that this decorative style is called Chinoiserie (French for “Chinese-esque”). At the time of George the IV, this style was very popular in England. Very few people had ever been to China, so they decorated based on the few touristy souvenirs travellers brought back. The inside of the place was horribly ugly, but in an amazingly ornate and fascinating way. It was so ugly, that it was almost pretty.

(They don't let you take pictures inside the Royal Pavilion, so I stole these off of the Internet. They don't really do it justice, but I think you get the idea.)

After the Royal Pavilion, bobby and I headed down to the beach. Unfortunately, it was not quite warm enough to sit by the water for an extended period of time (although may Brits were doing it- they have thicker skin than I). However, we did enjoy some fabulous fish n chips and a nice walk along the pebbly shore to the Brighton Pier. The Pier has a very “Jersey shore” feel to it, and I used all of my 10p coins on the cheap little games (never take me to Vegas!!).





Feeling extremely exhausted, we walked through the collection of bohemian shoppes that make up “the Lanes” and caught a train for the hour-long ride back to London.

Overall, it was a very enjoyable day. We’ll have to head back to Brighton when it’s warm enough to sit on the beach and go swimming (my British friends say that this does happen, but I find that they have a different definition of what “warm” is than I).