Our world tour of the parks around Manchester has stepped up a gear with a little trip up to the very enormous and huge Heaton Park. It should be remembered that while we live in Heaton Chapel our particular Heatons are nowhere near this Heaton and that we had to go all the way round the M60 to get there. As this took about 20 minutes and was dead easy to find - Junction 19 and follow the brown signs!

We barely scratched the surface of the place really - heading from the southern car park past the Colonnade - a great big chunk of the old Manchester Town Hall and round the lake to the cafe where as it was pay day we blew a whole tenner on some very very rubbish but very heatwarming greasy grub. I was secretly hoping for cream teas, bone china and waitress service - but it's a bit more old chips, paper plates and three ladies behind the counter tripping over each other to make the tea. It was pretty quiet really, a few bored coppers, park wardens and some rogue pigeons provided suitably out-of-season ambience. Laurel had a whale of a time trying to charm and attract their attentions with loud caw-ing and big smiles.

With our lunch demolished we bundled Laurel up and continued our circuit round the lake taking in the swans, the end of the tram line (yes we will be coming back once the tramway and museum are open again) and some pretty tree stumps. All in all it was a great afternoon and we got in the car just in time to avoid a (rather serious) hail storm.