Lincoln Christmas Market

A couple of weekends ago the Christmas Market came to town. Lincoln has a rather famous Christmas Market, being one of the first English cities to really take up the German tradition years before the current trend in the UK to have small markets dotted here and there. Of course they are nothing compared to the real German Christmas Markets (of which I was lucky enough to frequent the year I was working in Berlin) but they will do!

This year was my first year to visit the Christmas Market in many - because for some reason I always seem to be away the weekend it comes. So I decided to invite T to come and see it because it felt like a very romantic thing to do and as I've never had anyone to share it with I thought it would be extra special.

Of course, the Lincoln Christmas Market runs from Thursday to Sunday and althought T wasn't arriving until the Saturday I still managed to go visit on Friday... and do you know why? Because my student (who is in a wheelchair) had never been and really wanted to go. So I pushed her almost all of the way up the hill (she had to get out and walk very slowly and unsteadily for the last bit of the really steep section because although we would have made it she kept getting nervous when every few steps I'd have to say "put on the brakes" *blushes*). Well you try pushing someone heavier than you up a really, really steep incline and see how well you do :op

Needless to say, however much I loved taking her up to the Market, I much preferred the more leisurely route I took with my sweetheart Saturday evening when everything was lit up and seemingly magical. We saw this beautiful music player (although T had to wait for ages for a teenage lad to stop dancing and jumping in front of his camera to take this picture - I'm glad he was taking this one because I might have just yelled at the lad out of sheer frustration at his rudeness)

We then found the "mediaevil craft market" in the Bishop's Palace and around the Cathedral Quarter (the rest of the market was in the castle grounds and round another tourist area of Lincoln). We saw some Romany painted pieces and the most gorgeous caravan (but unfortunately the picture quality is too low to share with you as all the photos were taken on T's phone as neither of us have a proper camera at the moment).

We then went into the Bishop's Palace and into the ruins to see even more handmade crafts. These masks were just so beautiful, the picture does them no justice at all.

It was all just so festive and, as I had suspected, romantic - walking around sharing Mulled Wine and looking at all the festive wares *sigh*. What a way to begin the year's festivities!!