None of us had ever visited Sheffield but Tom had selected Sheffield University as one of the options on his UCAS form. When they offered him a place we all decided to go to the offer holders day with him. Tom was going to visit the university whilst the rest of us were going to explore the city!

Stu had lots of work to do so Tom, Izzy and I drove up to Sheffield on the Friday afternoon so that we could check into our hotel and make the most of the facilities. What should have been a three hour drive ended up being closer to four and a half hours – the joys of driving around Birmingham and the M42 on a Friday! Although when we arrived we were really impressed with the hotel. I had booked us into the Best Western which was located on Victoria Quay. It had just been completely updated so our rooms were beautiful. After our drive we were quite tired so we just chilled out and waited for Stu to join us.

The following morning Tom and Stu went to the offer holders day whilst Izzy and I went exploring. We began by walking around the university buildings as Izzy was also considering her choices for the following year and then we came across Weston Park – a lovely green area with a pond and ducks in the center of the city.

^{Weston Park}

We then wandered towards the shopping area of the city and found a lovely coffee shop – Marmadukes where we had coffee and banana bread.

^{Marmadukes Coffee Shop}

We had a bit of time to waste before lunch so we did a little bit of shopping and then explored the Peace Gardens at the Town Hall and winter gardens which is the largest urban glasshouse in Europe and full of plants and trees.

^{Peace Gardens and Winter Gardens.}

By this stage Tom was finished at the university so we went for lunch. We had spotted a BBQ restaurant called Smoke BBQ so I had booked us a table online. The food was American smoke house style and included burgers, ribs etc. Stu and I chose meat platters whilst Tom had a burger and Izzy ordered pulled pork. The food was really good but having eaten in smokehouses in Texas the UK never compares!

^{Lunch at BBQ Smokehouse}

We returned to the hotel for the afternoon where Tom & Izzy used the pool before heading out for the evening. We decided to eat in Wagamama’s as it was just easy!

Walking back to the hotel we spent ages trying to take aesthetic photos with all the lights. We loved Sheffield – considering we knew nothing about the city we were really impressed with how beautiful it was and everyone was so friendly. We were very happy when Tom selected it as his first choice!

^{Sheffield at night!}