Ireland and England Trip - Day 9 of 11

SUNDAY

We got up at 7:30 with the alarm, did all our morning rituals, and went downstairs for breakfast. There were seven people in the elevator which was pretty much the capacity even though the sign said 13. While we were at breakfast I noticed a couple of fairly large bears wearing Manchester United kit from the previous day's match, as well as the highly illustrated dude and his buddy we shared the elevator with, and a rather mismatched pair of young dudes, one rather short and lean and the other closer to our size. After breakfast we returned to the room and watched most of a game show.

At 10:30 we met Tim and Mark in the lobby and walked to Piccadilly Gardens tram station. A tall and rather thin black lady inquired how to get to Eccles, and we worked out a route on the map to get around the track closure between us and St. Peter's Square. We took the tram to Queen's Road, where the lift was so slow arriving that we concluded it was broken and took the stairs. Of course, the car had just made it to the lower level when we arrived at the top. Mark called the elevator to verify it was operating, looked inside and announced it smelled like it had been pissed in. This prompted another chorus of That Smell by Lynyrd Skynyrd. Later I shared the whole thing with Tim and Mark as we waited for the bus to the Museum of Transport Greater Manchester. I was expecting the public bus and was pleasantly surprised to board a heritage bus operated by the museum staff, which took us directly to the museum entrance.

Gary went to purchase admission and was pleasantly surprised to receive complimentary admission for the four of us (likely on account of our age). We toured the exhibits, then boarded another heritage bus to Heaton Park, where there's another museum dedicated to vintage trams. (Unfortunately, they're not able to actually operate the trams at the moment.) After touring the tram museum, we walked around to the lakefront café for lunch, tea and coffee.

We determined it was closer (therefore less walking) to catch the regular tram from Heaton Park Station than to return via the heritage bus. On the way we passed through a fun fair, where Mark stopped briefly to peruse a variety of sweet treats on offer from a truck called Truly Scrumptious (named perhaps for a female character in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang). We then passed a concert in an outdoor venue a medium distance from the path to the station, and finally got a bit up close and personal with a herd of about a dozen Highland Cows (the ones with the bangs) who were grazing close to the fence around their pasture. From there it was a short walk to the tram station, where we caught a specially rerouted tram between Bury (pronounced more like "burry" than the word for interment) and Ashton-under-Lyne due to the closed section of tracks by St. Peter's Square. Mark left at Market Street, we left at Piccadilly, while Tim remained on board. There was a backup on the escalator toward the exit because an older lady struggled with her luggage, so we continued on to the lift we tried to use last time and successfully reached the second-floor exit. We stopped by W.H. Smith and I bought us bottles of water, black currant soda, and snacks. As we left the station, we noticed a footbridge across the street and used it to reach the hotel from the other side. As we were about to enter the bridge, we crossed paths with a cute cub in shorts. 🎶 He got legs... 🎶

We returned to the room to recharge both our phones and ourselves, having arranged to meet up with Tim for dinner at 18:30 about three hours thence. We were going to have dinner at Pho Cue, but there was at least a 20 minute wait, so we went across the street to Dragon Oriental Restaurant. Tim was skeptical because the staff were vigorously ushering us in, but the food was delicious and the prices were decent.

From there we walked over to the Eagle for Beareoke, catching the tail end of Sunday Service with the last drag performance before the two bears operating the karaoke machine set up for the evening. A tall young dude noticed my Quake Rugby T-shirt and mentioned he'd played for the local gay rugby club, the Spartans. We later learned his name is Chris. Later, the cute dude with the ginger Mohawk and the high tenor voice introduced himself as Joshua. The cubby bartender also asked me about the Quake Rugby T-shirt and, when I asked if he knew Shaun, mentioned he had dated both Shaun and Jake back in the day, and introduced himself as David. I started with Heathens by 21 Pilots (down the octave, which impressed both Tim and our hosts), Gary did Beautiful by Carole King, I sang There Is Life Outside Your Apartment from Avenue Q, then we did as a duet What Have I Done to Deserve This? by Pet Shop Boys and Dusty Springfield. There was a long-haired cub who went by Lillibet (a pet name for QEII in her childhood) who was celebrating his birthday, and his ginger-bearded partner whose name I thought I heard as Jim. Tim told me Lillibet was the Dom and Jim the furry sub. At the end of the evening I inquired at the bar for the souvenir T-shirts, and David found two in our size, a black and an orange.

We found our way back to the hotel and parted company with Tim at the door. We got to sleep about two.