■ - Busy at the moment, but I hope to have some time off coming up, and I'll be back on here t...
■ - Busy at the moment, but I hope to have some time off coming up, and I'll be back on here then. I have the urge to write some reviews! Love, Jai .xxx. - ■
I'm kind of limited when it comes to shopping areas, unless I have £15 to throw away on the train journey to Cardiff. For me, Swansea is a £4.30, hour and a half bus ride from home, or a 20 minute drive.
When it comes to the shops, town centre is pretty good. It has a diverse range of shops to suit young and old. The one thing I dislike is the fact that it's so spread out. Woolworths and Argos are on opposite sides of town, all the banks are a few roads up on the Kingsway, there are so many branches of Clinton Cards I've lost count. Personally, and maybe this is just me, I don't find it easy to find shops in Swansea. If you're after a certain shop and you don't know where it is but you're pretty sure there's one around, you're pretty much resigned to walk the streets until you find it. Try finding Holland & Barrett in the rain with heavy bags.
There are also some hidden gems in Swansea. Rowberry's shoe shop in Picton Arcade stock shoes to rival Schuh in Cardiff. Blue Print Trading opposite Argos is fantastic for up to the minute fashion at exceptionally cheap prices. The Farm, although expensive, stock wonderful ranges of hand-to-find gear like Punky Fish, Emily Strange, Pucca and many other retro cartoon characters. The Sheep Shop is wonderful if you're Welsh and patriotic, after a gift for someone or just like sheep. They sell lovely little gifts that would suit just about any member of your family whether 3 or 93 years old. The Works is a cheap bookshop in the Quadrant which sell books far far cheaper than you'd find anywhere else, and you'd be pushed to find a book more expensive than £5 in there, and I mean huge hardback reference books. The Half Price Jewellers sell some of the most amazing jewellery for even more amazing prices. I think £50 is their most expensive and that would be for a solid 9ct gold heavy chain. Their silver range is generally £5 and under.
As for the well-known department stores, they're all here - Superdrug, WHSmith, Debenhams, Boots, Warehouse, Faith, The Body Shop, Game, HMV, New Look, Littlewoods, Topshop/Topman, Marks and Spencer, BHS, David Evans, Argos, Bay Trading, Pilot, Our Price, Claires Accessories, Woolworths, Waterstones, Primark, Bon Marche, Peacocks, Wilkinson to name but a few.
My favourite shop in Swansea would be The Works in the Quadrant, because I always manage to pick up a book I've been searching for in there, and usually about £7 cheaper than in WHSmith. I also love Waterstones book store, which used to be a huge old cinema, going to the upstairs section is so comfortable, it's like going into a library. They have sofas and everything! I find Waterstones expensive (They were once selling a book for £25 when it was only £10 on Amazon.co.uk!) but they're huge range of book and extensive humour section makes up for that, plus they have a small sale section all year round. HMV is good during the sales (Kevin Smith DVD's for £5, where can you go wrong?) but it is usually crowded and you have to battle through crowds to get to the checkout queues.
On the other side of Swansea, within walking distance from the main shopping area, is a big business park - Parc Tawe - which has onsite parking, a Toys-R-Us superstore, a big outlet of JJB Sports, Brantano Footwear, Petsmart, Lidl, Outfitters and Homebase. There is also a cinema and Mega Bowl there.
As for parking and transport, The Quadrant is a huge bus station, consisting of 20-odd bays and thats just the First Group buses. There are many others. The train station is at the top of the high street, which is a fairly rough area and a 10 minute walk from the centre of town. Parking isn't bad, there are two multi-storey car parks and much hilarity ensues when you spend half an hour walking around the six floors of cars looking for yours, thinking "Oh my god, my car's been stolen!" and then your mum says "Wasn't our multi-storey made of red brick?" and you realise you've actually come to the wrong car park. (Yes, this has happened to me. Twice.)
In short, I've never come away dissappointed.
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Nice well written review of Swansea there, loads of information in there...Something for everyone...Spend,spend,spend by the sound if it .....Roy
salem_witch 03.05.2004 22:50
It sounds nice. I've never been to Swansea though. I don't think I've been passed Cardiff!
jehowe 23.04.2004 12:33
Wow that brings back some memories... walking through Debenhams to get to the bus station and managing not to be able to find the door! Haven't been to Swansea in years as when we come back our families now live closer to Cardiff. I do remember how expensive the relatively short train journeys were though - much different up North and we're spoilt for choice with cities to shop in - Leeds is excellent. ~ Greayt review! Jo :O)
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Apr 7th, 2004
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