New-ca-stle, New-ca-stle : Saturday 28/3/26

Finally it has arrived, the reason for our trip and why we are missing weeks of Lewie's life. Like one third of his life.... 

But first breakfast with Phil , Paul's cousin and his wife in Tom's bar where they do good gluten free.  Note, Phil and Leanne are not massive fans but just got tickets today. However they got to the fan fest thing in Fremont St early, got a great spot and great photos with the players etc.  Were we jealous? One of us was......

Anyway, then a taxi to the game which unfortunately had to drop us off a couple of #$%^& kilometres  from the stadium. We needed to go up and down the Haciendas bridge.  In the hot sun. Not fun. 

We eventually fond the special area we had paid for which had free food and drink. This was arranged through a friend of Paul's from Hello world who were very helpful and lovely to us, saving us a seat at a table and everything. 

Just for the blog

Unfortunately the venue had not got the $$^& gluten free memo.  The Flight centre people were helpful and reminded them of the email about the $%^&* gluten free . I did manage to eat the salmon with fingers crossed and lettuce.  

The food bar

Desserts for non-coeliacs

and more for non coeliacs. I got a brownie and rice bar with marshmallow, only after the Hello world people made a big fuss. thankyou.

Our seats were up 16 rows or down 20 rows and we were downstairs except that they closed the downstairs between games and at half time.  Actually that is when you want to use the #$%^& stairs down.  So i had to make the trip up only once. Then i decided i could just sit there.

The atmosphere was amazing with so many Newcastle fans. Also lots of Hull and Leeds supporters for their game. They sang and really added to the atmosphere.  Unfortunately their game was not very close nor exciting.  

However the game featuring Newcastle and Cowboys was close and very exciting. I was always confident of a win as I am generally and Paul was always confident of a loss as he is generally.

And then we won!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Almost euphoric.

Excellent. We walked back to the hotel, only 2 km and celebrated.

the stadium

a nice shot of a lit up excalibur casino/hotel

Cheers to the Knights.