SAMLESBURY HALL
Pressing blindly on to Preston..
We rang mission control- manned by Mr Wright because the instructions of Mr Smith- The Super- to our next destination were somewhat vague. So were the opening hours!
We arrived at Samlesbury Hall- a beautiful- unfeasibly decorated- Tudor Hall, feeling smug and worthy with our spirits lifted from the knowledge that we had beaten the traffic jams and gyratories and still had 25 minutes to gander. With this small victory in hand we bounced in and used their loo, excited about our impending visit. 5 minutes later we drooped out again after a disappointing meeting with the witches of Samlesbury. They had basically changed their mind about their opening hours somewhere between the website, all the signs outside the building, all the signs inside the building, the sign at the desk (which we were stood in front of) and us arriving and requesting entry. Was it our faces or merely their desire for an early night- whatever it was, we couldn't get in. So we left, spitting venom.

Do go, if you can be arsed. It looked amazing from the outside, but don't say that we sent you because they hate us. And quite frankly they're not our favourite new friends either and we would really like to not give them the satisfaction of sending visitors their way when they couldn't see their way just let us in to nose about- with 25 minutes to spare, goddammit.

Everyone we'd met so far had been lovely, but suddenly it was time to leave the north. We're not saying they drove us away, but Samlesbury Hall was very CLOSED.. to us, and the M6 South was too close to pass by. So we drove ourselves away. Besides, we had a date to keep with a curry in Brum. We were going to go to the New Inn in Whitehall.  But we didn't. We got on the M6. We were going to go to Blackpool to see the sea and the lights. But we didn't. We got on the M6.