Family Time - Pride of Paisley

Paisley is currently gearing up for the City of Culture bid in 2021 and as a tiny part of that they have began displaying brightly coloured lions all over the town with clues which makes up a trail. This is the map that helps guide you through it.

We did the trail on Sunday 17th July, and the kids loved seeing the brightly decorated lions and we had some ups and downs collecting the, clues.

This lion is Paisley Love Buddie on Causeyside Street and I think it was my daughters favourite.

This is Babylon Bill located outside Renfrewshire House (which is the main Renfrewshire Council building).  We started with this one as we parked the car close by - since there is free parking Saturday and Sunday in all Council marked parking bays.

This lion is Frae Paisley to Persia and is located at the Lagoon Leisure Centre.

 This lion is Rainforest and is located at the junction outside St Mirren's Cathedral.  We got many strange looks taking pictures at this one as this junction is very busy with 4 sets of traffic lights!

This lion is Chewy the Wookie Lion and we couldn't get into scan the QR code on it as it was within the locked gates of the Wynd Centre.  But it still looks cool even from a distance

This lion is Wild Paisley and is located outside Oakshaw Trinity church. 

This lion is The Paisley Pharaoh and is located outside the Paisley Museum.

This lion is Buddie the Builder Lion and is located at the UWS Paisley campus entrance.

This lion is Ramble and is located at Slug in a Bottle site near the Main UWS Paisley campus.

This lion is Weavers Lion and is located on the Paisley High Street.

This lion is called Mystique and is located at Paisley Cross.














The large lions, decorated by artists were outside, however the smaller lions (32 of them) that all have letters on them, are inside shops, restaurants and other businesses. As we did our trail on a Sunday we got less than half the letters collected as most of the businesses were closed, some had them visible in the window or put up photos of the lions with the letters, others had full metal shutters down which meant you can't see in at all. So we plan to try again on a Saturday to collect all the clues.

We didn't find all the large lions as the kids were exhausted from finding the ones we did see. You forget how big the town center is until you walk the length and breadth of it lion hunting. Two of the lions aren't within Paisley either, one is at Glasgow airport (although only 5 minutes away from where we were in the town centre we were already tired and didn't go) and the other is in Glasgow Central train station, which I keep meaning to scan the barcode on it, either before or after work - as this is the train station I use daily to get to work.We did get to see the lion designed by my kids' school and although they weren't chosen to help on it, they are very proud of it.

Lion designed by one of the schools

Lion designed by one of the schools

http://www.prideofpaisley.co.uk/

Family Time - Glasgow Botanic Gardens & Kibble Palace

Kibble Palace

Kibble Palace - Then

Kibble Palace - Now

Botanic Gardens Glasgow

Glasgow Botanic Gardens - Then

Glasgow Botanic Gardens - Now

On Sunday, my daughter Sophie was attending the Judo group at a High School across from the Botanic Gardens in Glasgow, so I thought I'd take my son in as he's never been.

We spent an hour looking around including in the play park, but any longer and I'd have been dragging around a grumpy 5 year old.


One area in particular he did like (once he read what it said on the door)

 
Venus Flytraps

Once Sophie and John joined us it wasn't long before he couldn't resist the urge to get a picture of me with the naked statue (as always, so mature haha!).

Yvette & the naked statue

Of course no sunny day in the park is complete without ice cream...although we waited until we got home before eating ours.

I would advise if you're prone to passing out with heat, not to venture into the Botanic Gardens as it is tropical heat.  Although there were many leaflets and boards about animals and birds, those are elsewhere in the park so we didn't see any of them (always disappointing).