Mini Holiday - Bath!

This is the first time I'm writing a blog like this. I'll figured it might be nice to include small elements of the more interesting parts of my life to break up the reviews and beauty posts a little bit. The boyfriend and I decided on a mini holiday as a treat after having worked a lot over the Christmas period. We wanted to go somewhere with a significant amount of British history and Oxford and Bath were at the top of the list. As you've probably guessed we went with Bath as both of us had previously visited Oxford.

If you love British history and love taking pictures of monuments that represent a culture's diversity, Bath is definitely a lovely place to visit. The town centre consists of mainly buildings that follow a 'big brick' structure that really leaves you feeling as though you've stepped back in time a little. I think some of the buildings have been newly constructed but there are many others that are truly historical, such as the Bath Abbey Church and of course the Roman Baths.

One side of the Bath Abbey. Unfortunately I didn't exactly see the mini construction site
when I was taking the picture, but never mind.

The amazingly grand organ!

The Bath Abbey was very beautiful and interesting, there were tombstones all over the walls and floors, made me think if people are actually buried there, I never found out unfortunately ^^"

The Roman Baths was very interesting, to try and imagine how the Romans pampered themselves really is quite a difficult task! Maybe my imagination was running a little dry that day but I will always find it fascinating how archaeologists piece random bits of artifacts together to reconstruct what the buildings looked like so many years ago. Of course one of the things that imprinted itself most deeply into my memory was the waterfall that is bright ORANGE, no joke, it really is orange! Look below! The orange colour is caused by the deposition of the iron in the water. I actually thought it was painted orange!

ORANGE!

The outside pool itself is probably the main attraction, and with the steam rising off the surface of the water, I couldn't help but dip a finger in after seeing other people do it. The water was warm! WARM! Naturally warm water never ceases to amaze me XD

There are actually signs (albeit small inconspicuous signs) telling you not to do this, and yes please listen to them. The water is actually untreated so god knows what is dwelling within the giant pool. The warm temperature most probably allows a huge number of bacteria to thrive too. If that doesn't scare you, just take a look at this picture.

Disgusting, huh? XD

It had rained just before I took the picture above, a clear blue sky is always a beautiful thing to see ^^
I also loved the pool that many people had thrown coins into. It's not a wishing pool so there is no point to throwing in a coin, but I followed suit anyway. It looked so magical with the rippling surface of the water and green lighting though ^^

Looks like it belongs in a fairytale to me ^^

And of course, you get to sample the water at the end of the tour, filtered and safe to drink! It's also naturally warm, but I must warn you, it tastes like blood! I didn't take a photo of the tap, it wasn't very interesting to look at and I was concentrating on drink the water asap XD

If you visit the Roman Baths, you should definitely check out the Pump Room next door for high tea or a light meal. It's such a beautiful room! The decor adds an air of elegance and there is always music playing from a live band of classical musicians ^^ I had my favourite cream tea, as usual, at the Pump Room. There is just something quite decadent about it. Although the scones were a little too gluey for my liking, the clotted cream was to die for. The other half had carrot cake which was moist and delicious ^^ I didn't get any good shots of the room unfortunately; I'm not exactly one with a natural flair for photography, but take my word, it was a beautiful room! XD

Cream tea! *drools*

For the full Bath experience, you need to check out Sally Lunn! It's an extremely old house that incorparates a homely little restaurant  selling their famous Sally Lunn Bath bun, with a very small museum where you can look find the old foundations of the house, the kitchen (where I think Sally Lunn baked?) and stalagmites and stalactites that formed behind the kitchen! (If anyone's wondering, Sally Lunn was a French refugee who made this part bread, part bun and part cake bun using her brioche-making know how). I had the Sally Lunn Cream Tea both times we visited; instead of scones you get half a (huge) bun topped with butter with separate pots of clotted cream and jam! The other half tried the bun with cinnamon butter and clotted cream, also truly droolworthy! And he tried bread and butter pudding made with the Sally buns the second time round. It was delicious but the portion was a little small :( All members of staff are very polite and helpful too! I think I should stop selling Sally Lunn now but it is truly delightful ^^

Sally Lunn!
I have no idea what the red box is.

Sally Lunn cream tea. I wish I was eating it now :(

The very old kitchen found in the mini museum downstairs.

Just the left side of a sealed room showing the house foundations, different floor levels throughout history and a cellar doorway. It's so hard to imagine what things looked like back then!

The stalagmites and stalactites behind the kitchen! So long and thin! o.O 

And I've come to the end of my mini trip. I did visit the Holborne Museum, it's an art museum which is basically wasted on me because I have no idea how to appreciate art ^^" I'm more of a natural history museum type ^^ If you live in England and haven't been to Bath before, I highly recommend you give it a visit. Just simply walking around the narrow cobbly streets will give you an enriching experience that I would never get in the busy, bustling city that is my hometown.

Hope you had fun reading about my little excursion ^^

Jia

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1 Day Acuvue Define Lenses in Vivid Review

Long time no post! I cannot believe it's already halfway past January, where does the time go? *sigh*

Here is my second and final review for this particular series of lenses. This review will be shorter than the other one as I didn't see the point of photographing the box and blister packs of these lenses as they are the same as the lenses I reviewed anyway, bar the name and design of the lens. If you haven't read my other review yet, you can find it here.

The design of the lens is a tad simple, it consists of just a milky chocolate brown colour with lots of uneven spikes radiating the centre of the lens. However I find these lenses, much like the Natural Shine ones, are able to enhance your eyes in the most subtle way without being boring. These lenses look very natural indeed on my brown eyes, even more so than the Natural shine due to the colour being brown. The shade of brown is lighter than my natural eye colour, which creates a sort of milky halo that I find very pretty. The enlargement once again is minimal but still enough to make your eye subtley pop.

Sorry for the dodgy colouring! The colour is actually quite a bit darker!

With the other lenses, I had a problem with the sclera appearing through in some photographs. I have the same problem with these lenses too (you can see it very slightly on the photograph below) as both the Natural Shine and Vivid lenses share the same base curve and the ring design is quite narrow, but the degree to which you can see the sclera is not as severe with these lenses. I also have a problem with blurriness with these lenses due to the base curve,which really annoys me as I really love the effect these lenses give TT

I love how these lenses make my eyes look  naturally larger and 'vivid' :D

With one lens in and one lens out, the enlargment is more noticeable, but I'm sure you'll agree that these lenses are probably one of the most natural you will come across.

Not a severe o.O look, but still noticeable!

Comfort-wise, these are just like the Natural Shine lenses, the lenses are very soft (to the point where it can be a little frustrating sometimes to get the lens into a bowl shape on your finger) and hence very comfortable. However the base curve problem makes it difficult for my eyes to focus properly and hence can cause some discomfort.

My Verdict

Design: 2.5/5
A little boring but I like how the spikes help the colour blend into my natural eye colour.

Effect: 5/5
Sweet and natural is what I would use to describe how my eyes look with these lenses.

Enlargement: 3/5 
Little enlargement but still enough to make your eyes cuter and more dolly. Even though the diameter is the same at Natural Shine, I find these lenses give a slightly larger enlargement effect.

Comfort: 3/5
The base curve problem really annoys me, but remember if you don't have a problem with the 8.5 base curve, these will probably be the most comfortable lenses you'll ever wear.

I would repurchase if it wasn't for the base curve problem, but I don't think it's a wise idea for me to buy them again.

If you don't have the base curve problem, then I'll give you two thumbs up to try these lenses :D


Between Vivid and Natural Shine, I like both designs equally but each one has it's own special effect. Vivid has a more believable effect, creating cuter, rounder eyes.
Natural Shine however creates an air of mystery due to the grey limbal ring. Brown eyes don't have a grey limbal ring naturally (but if you know someone who does, let me know! I'd love to see! ^^), hence why it creates a more interesting effect.

Hope my review was useful

:)

Jia

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