Thousands of visitors flocked to the North East coast to enjoy 1.5 miles of live music, food stalls and, of course, the opportunity to see some of the most famous vessels in the world.
Never one to pass up the opportunity to celebrate how fabulous the North East is I popped to Blyth late on the Saturday afternoon to enjoy the last of the sunshine with my friend Sam. The beautiful boats decked out in colourful bunting stretched the length of Blyth quayside and we had a lovely walk soaking up the atmosphere and trying to take the perfect boat selfie.
The Commissioners Quay Inn is a brand new pub, restaurant and inn overlooking the historic Blyth quayside. The pub is huge with plenty of seating and a welcoming atmosphere and serves up home-cooked pub grub (which in all honesty is my favourite kind of food!) Its position by the water makes it the perfect stop off for families, cyclist, walkers and holidaymakers and if you love it so much that you don't want to leave there are 40 ensuite bedrooms offering comfortable accommodation and the perfect base to explore the region (you can even book yourself into a room with a beautiful balcony just like the one we had!)
Having studied the menu pretty carefully before arriving I was pretty keen to sample some of the food on offer so was thrilled when we were treated to some afternoon tea in our room. As we all know, afternoon tea is one of the greatest joys in life and having munched my way through a lot in my time I am not easy to impress!
The spread was delicious with freshly made sandwiches and generous slabs of cake. It was the mammoth scones topped with greedy amounts of jam and cream that had my eyes popping out of my head though. All thoughts of my carefully applied lipstick flew out of the window as soon as I had one of these beauties in my hand, I wolfed it down in record time and it was so good!
After those epic scones it's safe to say I'll definitely be returning to the Commissioners Quay Inn with Simon very soon, I've spotted some sundaes on the dessert menu that I know he'll love.
When we weren't stuffing ourselves with too much cake we were standing on the balcony admiring the beautiful views with bottomless flutes of Prosecco. Looking out over the water and hearing the happy giggles of the families below, I had a perfect moment of feeling completely content. It's events like this that make me truly proud to live in the North East. Blyth really was the perfect place for the Tall Ships to dock.
Events like the Tall Ships bring the community together and we were very privileged to be spending our evening with a wonderful group of people. Claire from Impact PR, some ladies from Blyth Lifeguards and a soldier and his wife. Talking to someone who not only served our country in Afghanistan but also survived an awful attack was so humbling and really gave me a reality check. I love evenings spent getting to know new people and our evening flew by as we chatted with our new friends sharing funny stories and silly memories.
As we began to lose light and the ships turned into beautiful silhouettes against the evening sky we found ourselves rummage in the wardrobes for fleecy blankets ready for the fireworks.
The lovely folks at the Commissioners Quay Inn invited us to enjoy the fireworks from their roof which was a dream come true for me. I am obsessed with great views and it's not every day you're able to wander about on a roof offering such great views.
Snuggled up under our blankets it wasn't long before the sky was alight with bright pops of light that lit up the tall ships in vibrant blues, greens and reds. What a sight!
Positioning ourselves behind the official event photographers who were up on the roof with us Sam and I enjoyed picking up some photography tips although I'm not sure we did terribly well - shooting fireworks is definitely something I need to work on!
The display was over far too soon and feeling slightly cold we returned back to the room to toast a wonderful night with new friends and munch on a bacon buttie before going our separate ways.
Huge thank you to the Commissioners Quay Inn for treating me to such a special event and to the lovely Jackie who did such an amazing job of looking after us all evening.
Let me know if you visited the Tall Ships in Blyth and what your experience was like, I've seen some truly amazing photographs and heard some great stories since the ships left us and I'd love to hear some more!
How good are we at taking fireworks pics - we OBVIOUSLY picked up some pro-photography tips up on that roof :D
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