Falling 'Intu' Love With The MetroCentre

I remember the Metrocentre opening, because I'm old you know, but actually if you were over the age of about 7 in 1986 you will probably remember looking into the night sky to see the beams of huge celebratory searchlights shining upwards, visible for miles, I remember the massive adventure of going with your mates on a weekend to the huge cinema,  spending pocket money in The Body Shop on fuzzy peach or white musk! Going to the 'hippy shop' for jewellery and incense! So my love affair is long standing with our amazing Metrocentre we even purchased my engagement ring in a gorgeous wee jewellery store in the antique village, but once I started working in Newcastle I found my visits less frequent and then a bit of bad planning led to the worst shopping day of my life, and thus Metrocentre and I had a parting of ways!

Let me paint a picture, 7 years ago, with a 3 week old baby in tow I decided it would be wise to head to the Metrocentre at tea time 3 days before Christmas on the BUSIEST SHOPPING DAY OF THE YEAR! I should tell you that my darling child was feeding hourly and I had not slept for 3 weeks so the traffic jam lasting an hour had started us off on the wrong foot, on arrival I abandoned my husband in the car leaving him to park while I found a place to whip out the boobs privately. On my journey to find such a magical place (thank you mothercare) I was stopped by a 'kindly' lady selling makeup. 'Do you use our products? 'Err yes I wear mineral makeup' and I swear she pulled the face that says someone just farted and said 'ooh love it's doing nothing for you let me show You ours' 

I burst into tears and ran headlong through Mothercare into the baby feeding area. The afternoon got worse, Peanut screamed the whole time, I couldn't remember what I wanted to buy, and we got stuck in a 3 hour queue to get back (empty handed) on the motorway! 

Never again I swore! NEVER EVER AGAIN! 

Fast forward 6 years and a pal of mine said you should head to The Metrocentre, I recounted the torrid tale and she scoffed, she actually scoffed!!! 

'Oh give over that was years ago the place is bigger and better than ever the Food Hall has been overhauled the cinema is state of the art and there are more choice of fab shops than ever. There's loads of space for prams, lots of places to sit down and rest and loads to see and do. Plus better parking than ever , I'll be honest with you though her convincing point was that we could go to Wagamama for lunch!

So we headed off and I must tell you I'm back in Love! The Centre has been extended since I was last here and overhauled somewhat  with nicer more natural feeling light, lots of space, loads of choice of shops and it's easy to navigate with clear signage and easy to find maps, theres even a 'here to help' lounge!

we parked with no trouble in fact there was loads of space. We parked looking onto a huge Krispy Kreme cafe and although I was very tempted I resisted this time but next time I'm getting me some of them! We headed straight to the Lego shop (sorry bestie for keeping you there an hour!) passing gorgeous shops along the way, then had a casual day mooching around all the amazing stores. We could have visited swanky looking cocktail bars and some cracking designer shops but with a weeny teeny in tow we stuck to the more Mumsy choices and had a very productive day

We found the food court (I'm not sure that it's referred to in such an old fashioned way now!) easily and were ushered to a lovely table in Wagamama where we filled out bellies and renewed our energy for a bit more shopping. 

Several pounds lighter, one Olaf, some Disney merchandise and an hour later we left to pick the kids up from school, worrying that traffic would be bad we left way to early and got out of the car park and down the motorway with enough time for a cuppa before school run! 

So there you are my love for IntuMetro Centre has returned and rightly so,