Turkey Travels ~

Hello my lovelies!

As I'm sure you're aware, I went to Turkey at the end of August for two weeks with my family (minus my oldest brother who is currently training to be a diving instructor in Egypt).

We flew into Antalya International Airport and checked ourselves into a beautiful 4 star resort hotel about half an hour away from the airport. Now this was a holiday all about relaxing - we've all had pretty stressful years (me doing my A Levels, my brother finishing his degree, my dad fighting with work, my mum keeping us all sane and alive) so we didn't actually leave the hotel once during the fortnight we were there. That may not be everyone's cup of tea, but it suited us down to the ground. It was a holiday of sunbathing, lots and lots and lots of reading, swimming in the sea, and drinking. Lots of drinking.

 The view from our balcony - absolutely beautiful

Listening to Vampire Weekend on the beach - perfection

5 days before we were due to leave, we randomly got upgraded to a fancy suite free of charge! This meant that we had two large bedrooms between the four of us, both with en suites containing huge jacuzzis, and their own balconies; a living room between; and a third bit of balcony with a private pool! We still don't know why they upgraded us, but we certainly weren't complaining.

 Our private pool at night

 Chillin' in the private pool one lunch time

The view from our new room - equally beautiful

Aside for the gorgeous weather (it was between 32 and 37 degrees C every single day, only dropping to about 26 in the evenings), my favourite part of the holiday was definitely getting the chance to read for fun. In the fortnight I read 7 books: WinterGirls by Laurie Halse-Anderson, Q: A Love Story by Evan Mandery; The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman; Tenth Circle by Jodie Picoult; Life After Life by Kate Atkinson; When God Was a Rabbit by Sarah Winman; and The Magician's Guild by Trudi Canavan. If you would like more information/to hear my thoughts on these books in a future post or video, let me know in the comments.

I also enjoyed simply lying on the beach listening to my iPod and watching the sea and the other people paddle in the water. Two songs that I kept returning to on this holiday that you should definitely check out were All of This by The Naked and the Famous, and Sloom by Of Monsters and Men. Both very different songs; both excellent.

All in all it was an absolutely wonderful holiday and I got to spend some brilliant quality time with my family, including spending about 2 hours one night after dinner with my brother coming up with bad jokes and puns. I have returned with a beast of a tan, lovely blonder hair, and apparently I look more healthy than I've looked in 3 years. Wonderful.

Thanks for reading, let me know in the comments if you went anywhere lovely this summer :)

PSSSSSST - yesterday I uploaded the third Letters to Me series in which I write a letter to my past self for every year of secondary school. Be sure to subscribe to see the rest of the videos that will be coming out in the next couple of weeks!

Brighton Babyyyyy~

Hello my lovelies!

Today I come to you with a slightly different post - a travel(ish) post! On Thursday me and my friends Rosie and Heni hopped on a train and went to Brighton for a couple of days. It was a short trip but an utterly fabulous one nonetheless, particularly as I'd never been to Brighton before (despite the fact that it's only a 2 hour train journey away from me). It's such a beautiful town, and full of all sorts of weird and wonderful surprises.

Highlights: 

• All the quirky vintage shops full of boxes of old black and white photographs 
• Buying a journal made of a recycled book that someone received as a Christmas present in 1911
• THE SEA
• Chatting to the people in the henna tattoo place
• 2 for 1 cocktails and fruity shots
• Buying wine and Pringles at 2am
• Stumbling across the open air cinema on the beach that was showing Les Mis
• Burger King as the perfect hangover breakfast

Lowlights:

• Being groped in the clubs far too much
• ...
• nope that's literally it
• the only bad thing about the trip

Overall Rating:

A solid 9/10. A beautiful place that I need to go back to and explore fully. A++ would recommend.

Thanks for reading!