A Day Trip To Brighton - from London

We spent all day Sunday in Brighton.  Same old gang: me, nephew, + niece + niece + of course Aaron.  BUT we had the addition of Grandma and Auntie (not the nieces and nephew's Mum).

This was us setting out:
(Please read right to the bottom as there is a video of our day out)

I would say a few things about a day trip to Brighton

1. We got adult same day off-peak return tickets for £10 and children's for £5 (one of the nieces and Aaron are under 5 years of age so they were FREE).  Only trouble is the ticket machine at Victoria lets you buy these and says to you FCC (first capital connect only) but when you go and look at the departure board all of the trains are "Southern".  You only get that FCC deal if you go from London Bridge, and there was me thinking you could only go to Brighton from Kings Cross or Victoria...  So luckily a member of staff took pitty on us and said "touch in here with your Oyster" and then "touch out at East Croydon" and then "at East Croydon you can catch the London Bridge train to Brighton".  THANK GOD he suggested that, as we had 4 children and a buggy and to get in and out of Victoria Underground there are steps; steps we had just negotiated and didn't really want to go near again (at least till the end of the day)!  And what made it even more awesome was the Brighton train from East Croydon came on the same platform as the train we got off from Victoria.  Thank you so much member of staff for your generosity of thought, in coming up with that ingenious idea.   That ticket machine does need sorting though!  In no way do you realise you are buying tickets to depart from a station other than where you are!!!
2. The weather does not have to be hot.  The internet said it would peak at 18 degrees in Brighton but we went anyway, and thank God we did as it actually peaked at 22 degrees.  We were warm enough in t-shirts and shorts (I only had to put a hoodie on Aaron on the way home).  We did not go in the water though, despite us all having cossies, as Grandma thought the water looked too choppie.  It did look quite rough to be honest.
3. The funfair rides there are SUPERB and there are lots for 2 year olds (like Aaron) but be warned you need a tall 2 year old, as there is a measure stick (minimum height requirement) at the entrance to each ride and for some you need to be 90 cm and for some a whole metre.
4. I have made a video, which best illustrates our day - as usual I am on weather watch, showing you the sky (I'm always doing this in my videos).  The rides on the beach are about £1.50 to £2 per person per ride.
5. The rides on the pier require tokens.  They are currently doing an offer of 30 tokens for £20.  We managed to make that stretch to 4 kids! The baby rides were only 2 tokens, so they got three rides each (with Aaron getting the spare 2 tokens to go on the baby rollercoaster ride one more time as he cried when it was time to get off).  The 2 older kids only got 2 rides each as their 1st one was 3 tokens each and their 2nd ride was 4 tokens each.  So effectively the tots got 14 tokens and the 2 older ones got 14 tokens, with Aaron getting the 2 spare tokens.  So we halved it by value rather than giving them the same amount of rides each - they were cool with that.
6. Anyway we had an amazing day and I would highly recommend it.
7. I haven't used the reigns since I bought them at Xmas, as I could never convince Aaron to wear them, but as it was his precious older cousin holding them all day, he never minded and now he LOVES his reigns.  Monday morning he asked me to put them on for him.  I would say for the journey there on a bus, tube and then train, and even while in Brighton, the reigns were invaluable, so we never had any big panics all day, with him always being within our sight :-)

I will leave you with the video I just spent an hour editing.

Liska xxx