A Bookish Road Trip

This past weekend, my two best friends and I went on a bookish road trip! We did a 500-mile round trip and visited many bookish places along the way. I had so much fun and I wanted to write a little post all about it!

Friday!

On Friday, Sarah, Sophie and I set off on our bookish road trip. We have a 4 hours journey ahead of us but of course, we planned a bookish stop to break up the journey.

We stopped at Astley Book Farm & Coffee Shop in Coventry, which is a huge farm full of second-hand books. We spent a good couple of hours wandering around and looking at all the books on the shelves. I even found a tiny table and chairs to have a quick read on. We grabbed a little bit of food in the coffee shop before heading off again.

A couple of hours later we arrived in Hemel Hempstead, which is home to the main reason we’d gone on this road trip, 66 Books. We weren’t visiting 66 Books until Saturday though. So, we dropped our things at the hotel and went to look at the Waterstones in Hemel Hempstead which was lovely, before heading for food and getting ready for a busy Saturday ahead of us!

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Saturday!

We all got up extra early on Saturday, grabbed some food and headed to 66 Books! If you don’t know what 66 Books are, they are a huge book wholesale warehouse which opens to the public one weekend a month for a ‘book club weekend‘. During the weekend, all books in the warehouse are 70% off!

We arrived prepared to queue but we got lucky! We were some of the first people in the warehouse, which was excellent. Somehow, we lost 4 hours in the warehouse and I couldn’t tell you how. We wandered up and down every single aisle of the two-floor warehouse and looked at as many books as we could.

If you are planning on heading to 66 Books, be aware that the warehouse isn’t particularly organised in an easy way to navigate. Take your time wandering up and down each aisle as you never know if you are going to find a hidden gem. Also, be prepared to queue. When we left we found out people had been queuing 2 and a half hours to get inside.

After hours of wandering, we joined the long queue with our baskets full of books and tried to think about what a whirlwind the experience was. I picked up 16 books whilst there and they cost me £47 which is incredible! I’m going to do a haul of the books I picked up very soon, so look out for that!

After our 66 Books trip, we headed to St Alban’s. Whilst there we went into the Waterstones, a few charity shops and the stunning Books on the Hill. If you are ever in St Alban’s be sure to take a trip to Books on the Hill, it is a stunning indie bookshop with so many incredible books. What a beautiful place St Alban’s is! I would love to go back there soon.

After a lot of book shopping, our feet were sore and we were ready for a sit-down. So, we grabbed some food, headed back to the hotel and played some games. It was another amazing day and 66 Books was well worth the trip!

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Sunday!

After a busy day on Saturday, we took our time getting ready and packing our bags before we got in the car ready for the journey home. Our plan was to stop at a few places on the way home to split up the journey and just have a lovely chill day.

We drove for a while before stopping in Leicester. Whilst there, we looked in a couple of charity shops and the Waterstones before getting back in the car and heading further towards home.

Our next stop was Nottingham! We found a few charity shops and picked up a few things. Then, we found two stunning indie bookshops. We visited Page 45 which is a lovely comic bookshop I will be sure to visit again. Then, we head to Five Leave Bookshop which was excellent and full of so many books I’d never seen before. I’d highly recommend a trip to both of these indie bookshops!

Our last bookshop stop was the huge Waterstones in Nottingham. We thought it was going to be a small Waterstones but it turns out, it is 5 floors packed full of books. We were overwhelmed and spent a couple of hours browsing the shelves here, grabbing a drink in the cafe and picking up a couple of books. I’m definitely going back to this Waterstones in the future!

We had one more stop for pizza before heading home. I was ready to sleep for a week but I had the best weekend with my best friends and I would very happily do it all over again!

There you have it, my amazing bookish weekend with my best friends. Be sure to look out for my book haul from the weekend, coming soon! Where would you go on a bookish road trip? Let me know in the comments!