A few photos from this weekend when I went away with some of my uni girls to the Norfolk coast. The suavest of british caravan holidays ever.

I’m not sure if Norfolk quite knew what hit it as I shipped my FIT friends into this quiet seaside town. There were definitely more than a few happy, retired, old men and taxi drivers with smiles on their faces as those ladies strutted their stuff down the promenade bedecked in some of the highstreet’s finest fashion - Topshop, H&M, Urban Outfitters, New Look, ASOS and Young British Designers were all very well represented. 

We all met at uni in 2005 and have been the best of friends ever since. This is just a teeny section of our group - there are almost 20 of us in total that have stayed good friends after leaving uni - despite being dotted all around the country. I’d say we try and meet up about 4 or 5 times a year - usually at Notting Hill Carnival or for one of our birthdays.

There are lots of perks to having friends that are as mad about shopping as you are and it helps that we’re more or less all the same size too - it’s like having 6 wardrobes and 6 makeup bags to choose from for inspiration instead of one.

We took a walk up the beach, bought homemade donuts covered in sugar and ate delicious butterscotch and caramel ice cream cones (see Soph’s photo above) followed by another walk around the shops to find a cafe for cups of cafe latte, hot chocolate with marshmallows and big fat scones with jam and cream, followed by another walk around the nik-nak-ey seaside gift shops where I purchased a nice War Time East Anglia printed tea towel. 

To top off our weekend, on Saturday night, we all dressed up and went out for a fabulous meal - very Sex and the City. We booked a table for 9pm. Dinner at The Hoste in Burnham Market was said to be pretty amazing -  this place is very popular with locals and holiday makers. It’s known as Chelsea-on-Sea because of it’s VIP visitors - Amanda Holden has a place near by as does Mr Bates from Downton Abbey… They serve great food and cocktails and their menu is made up of only the very best locally sourced and produced ingredients.

We ordered the following from the menu:

Starters

• 1 x Tian of Cromer crab served with piquillo peppers, cucumber noodles, and an amazing white tomato sorbet.
• 1 x Seared scallops with tempura black pudding and sweetcorn purée
• 2 x Fish cakes

Mains

• 1 x Butchers cut of the day (Duck)
• 2 x Norfolk Gressingham Duck Breast served with confit duck leg strudel, sautéed savoy cabbage, rosemary polenta fries
• 2 x herb crusted cannon of English lamb served with tenderstem broccoli, roasted shallots and creamy dauphinoise potato
• 1 x fillet of sea bass served with 
• oriental vegetable cashew nut stir fry and sweet chili potatoes with coriander dressing. 

To drink:

• 2 x Cosmopolitans
• 3 x Strawberry Daiquiri
• 3 x prosecco

Dessert:

• A special little platter of mini house Hoste sweets with a candle stuck in to wish Lizzie ‘Happy Birthday’. (Only a week early…)

Total cost: Around £250 - price approx £30-50 pp including drinks

Verdict: Bloomin’ lovely. Well definintely be back, maybe even as soon as next week! The restaurant was beautifully decorated and had some stunning landscape photography hanging on the walls. I now NEED a ginormous, art gallery worthy framed photograph on the wall in my next home*! 

The Hoste is a MUST visit if you are in the area and even if your not in the area. Book a table, book a taxi and fill your belly.

(*Makes a note on ‘to do’ list to go through library of 40,000 photos are choose a couple that’d look nice bloody massive.)

Photography © Lucie Kerley