You find me dear reader feeling ever so slightly sleep deprived, I'm writing this at approximately 3am on Wednesday morning, in 2 hours I leave to get the Megabus to Birmingham.  I am snuffly with hayfever and decided that I should sleep on the sofa so that I didn't wake Mr C when my alarm went off at 4am, it's unfortunate then that I can't actually sleep, I did doze off only to be awoken by a husky tap dancing in her cage, the dog has skills!

You may remember a few weeks ago that the good people of Facebook chose via a public vote chose to send me to Birmingham after a contest of peoples least favourite cities.  I'm actually quite excited because I think all cities have some amazing things in them to explore, especially if you haven't been before.

I've heard many wonderful reports of the Library of Birmingham and just looking at their page is enough to whet my appetite, have you seen that architecture, there's nothing else like it for sure and the views from the top are supposed to be amazing so that's going to be one of the first places I visit when I arrive in Birmingham at lunchtime.

This will be my first UK Cityscapes trip away on my own and I'll miss introducing one of my daughters to something they haven't seen before but of course this means the next time I return mum can be the official tour guide.

On Thursday I'll be taking trains to Coventry and Wolverhampton, worryingly, there isn't actually even an official tourist website for Wolverhampton but I'm sure I'll be able to find amazing things in both of the cities when I spend half a day in each of them.  Interestingly when I googled Coventry I found this article by a local describing it as the armpit of the midlands, maybe I should be slightly more trepidatious about my upcoming 3 days in the Midlands?

My first big adventure which of course I will be reporting back on will be my very first experience of the Megabus, for anyone who doesn't know, one of the most important aspects of my project is that of responsible travel, I am using only buses and trains (and maybe a ferry for Northern Ireland) for this whole project, I believe in slow tourism and green tourism, I think it's a better way to sustain economies, it's better for the planet and life is a nicer thing entirely at a more gentile pace, even though I know this and I am delighted that my fare to Birmingham is £5, yes £5 (a day ticket in Newcastle is £3.80) I am slightly worried about the quality of travel you get for a fiver when compared to the train which was £110 (that is return and you do have to take into account that my trip back was £15) so £20 in comparison to £90.  I suppose first of all there's the time aspect, 4 hours on the train as opposed to 6 hours by bus, the fact that I'm going on a bus at 5.30am in the morning and the bus does not have seat reservations so you could end up next to anyone but I suppose you could say that of the train too.

I'll certainly be tweeting about the experience on the go so if you are on Twitter please do follow me at http://twitter.com/MandyCharlton

Onwards to adventure!

UK Cityscapes made the news again!!

Good morning dear reader, I hope you're all bursting with energy at the prospect of a new week!  I was absolutely delighted to find that UK Cityscapes once again made it into the Sunday Newspapers again.

I'm obviously delighted that UK Cityscapes keeps finding it's way on to blogs and in newspapers and I really enjoy doing all of the interviews so if you would like to talk to me about the project just drop me an email

This week I'll be travelling to Birmingham on Wednesday on....The Megabus, yes my dear readers you heard that right, that's the kind of luxurious life I lead but I wasn't about to refuse a £5 fare to Birmingham, a day ticket around Newcastle is £3.80!!  Even on the way home on Friday it's only £15, I think this could be a turning point in the project as much cheaper travel might take a little longer but it also means I've a much better chance of completing the project on the budget I have!  Incidentally when I checked out the train fares it was £110 for a return so there's no competition really even though it'll take a couple of hours longer.

I have got my train tickets booked for Inverness and Aberdeen though and even that with a donation of a ticket to Edinburgh I managed to get all of the travel for £40.85, I just need to find similar great deals on hotels, I'm very lucky that when I go to Birmingham I am going to be staying with Sarah and Rob, 2 wonderful photographer friends I've known for a couple of years thanks to the internet. I'm so grateful that people are being so generous in so many different ways to make sure that the UK Cityscapes project succeeds.  I'm also delighted to be having a guided tour from another lovely photographer friend James in Birmingham and yes I have asked the question, why are all my friends who are photographers based in the middle part of the country, well they're not all from the Midlands but there are quite a few, you can thank the internet for that!

On Thursday I'll be going to Wolverhampton and Coventry, they're so close to each other that I am hoping a half day in each will suffice, especially as I'm going to be on my own and won't have to justify every single thing I do to my smaller people!  I can do anything I want!  I know I'm definitely going to Coventry Cathedral.

If you are a business based in any UK City and would like to jump on board and take advantage of all of the publicity I do offer advertising via banner ads and also sponsored blog posts so do get in touch, you can even choose to sponsor your city.

Exciting News, 3 days and 13% to go for UK Cityscapes

It's Wednesday and it's very early, well at the time of writing this it's before 8am which classifies the time as early for me, if you know me well you'll know I am not a fan of mornings!

So here's the up to date stats for the UK Cityscapes Project


There are 2 days, 12 hours and 10 minutes (at the time of writing) to go in the first phase which is the funding phase

I am £332 away from my funding target, that's only 13% or 3 business investors or 2 canvases + a book or 11 books or 1 complete collection of 69 prints + 2 books

I have been to 11 cities, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Newcastle, Durham, Sunderland, Carlisle, Liverpool, Sterling, Dundee, Perth and York.

Favourite cities so far, Newcastle (obviously) and Liverpool

Least Favourite City, Dundee, mostly due to the people, although I'm sure there are truly lovely people in Dundee the ones I came across were not.

I'll keep todays blog fairly short and to the point, here's what I'd love you to do, if you haven't pre-ordered a book or got yourself a canvas, print or even got your name in the book then do it now before it's too late, if you back the project it means you are part of the project and you can say that you helped the creation of the UK Cityscapes project and book.

Also, people are voting for their least favourite city of the UK on my Facebook page, go and place your vote to send me to Wolverhampton, Birmingham, Coventry, Stoke on Trent, Sheffield or Bradford and that's where I'll be going next week.

and I couldn't leave you without posting an image so here's something lovely from City 2/69 - Liverpool and it's intricately weaved landscape from 400 ft above.