Durham - Day 2

We've had another lovely day again today. It started with a nice swim in the hotel health club. It was the first time Courtney seemed to really enjoy it. Then we went to visit Mark's cousin Philip. It was great to catch up with him as it's been a long time since we'd seen him. His children are 18 and 12 now! We'll hopefully be seeing him again in July as he's hoping to come to John's (Mark's brother) wedding but he's not very well at the moment so hopefully by July he'll feel up to it. There is a really picturesque park just near to Philip's house so armed with bread we took Charlie and Courtney to feed the ducks and swans there. The swans were bigger than Courtney but she wasn't at all bothered by them, bless her!
We hadn't planned anything else so wandered off to the Metro Centre for a mooch! It's a very long time since I'd been there and although it's very similar to the Trafford Centre in Manchester somehow it just seemed a bit nicer atmosphere. In the centre we saw a little boy having a whale of a time on a bungee trampoline! Charlie was fascinated by it and wanted to have a turn! He wasn't as sure once he was on it but after a few confidence building jumps he really liked it and was smiling and laughing. We found a cafe to have a drink and cake each before continuing on to find the Build a Bear shop. Charlie has a dog called Scruff that we did with him a while a go so we thought it only fair that Courtney got to have a turn too! She chose a cat which has been named 'Whiskers!' She liked going around the shop doing all the different parts of making her, apart from the grooming area! There was an air jet there supposedly for sprucing up your bear but it was rather like a hand drier and it scared her! Whiskers is currently in her cot with her! I'm going to sit sand do some more cross stitch this evening. I think I'll make a start on the back stitch, that's always a tedious job but even worse if all left to the end!