My 12 Hours in Southend-on-Sea

Have to ever been to the UK? 

If yes, how many cities or towns you have been to other than just visiting the famous ones like London, Birmingham, Liverpool or Edinburgh? Well! The United Kingdom consists of 4 regions and those regions consist of nearly 69 cities and thousands of towns of which I am going to talk about the one that owns the longest pleasure pier in the world, Southend-on-Sea.

My 12 Hours in Southend-on-Sea

Currently being a resident of the UK, I am living in London, a city that is known for its magnificent ancient buildings. As London belongs to the southern part of England it becomes quite easy for Londoners to choose their weekend destination and I chose Southend. Southend is an hour away from the city, London and you can get on the train from Liverpool Street station. The train ticket costed me £15 for the return journey, from London to Southend and then back to London. A short and pleasant train journey made me feel happy as I didn’t have to travel for long. 

Southend-on-Sea

The moment I exited the Southend train station I saw a huge board written ‘Fish and Chips’ on it and at every third step I saw something similar. The hint I got with this was to not leave the town without having Fish and chips. I started walking towards the seafront with no idea of what exactly the place looks like and what exactly do I have to do here. After 10 minutes walk from the station I reached the pier hill ( a small hilly area). From there I could see the whole seafront that included a beach, an amusement park, a lot of restaurants inviting me to have fish and chips and a long pier, very long though. I got excited to get there. 

Southend Beaches

Along with the same water flow, there are two beaches. I first went to the one on the western side of the amusement park i.e the Westcliff beach. Though the winds were quite chilling I sat there for a couple of minutes watching other people playing beach games. Walking along the beach, I crossed the Southend end pier and went to the other side of the beach called the Jubilee beach. Here, there was a small market area that sold souvenirs, nice hats, and eatables like ice creams and waffles. The jubilee beach has a huge sand area where many kids were playing and having fun and it seemed absolutely like a kids paradise. Both the beaches are man-made and give a nice spot for families to spend some quality time. 

The Longest Pleasure Pier in the World. 

Did you know that the Southend pier is the longest pleasure pier in the world? Well! I came to know about it when I bought the entry ticket. I bought the ticket for £2. And it was a little surprise to know that I had to walk 5kms to reach the end of the pier and return. You will be surprised to know that there is also a train track on the pier and the train travels to and fro every hour carrying passengers who don’t wish to take a 5Km walk. But I chose to walk so I began walking. I guess walking was a much better decision as I could witness some great scenes throughout the walk. At the end of the pier, few food stalls served fish and chips, coffee and some desserts. But unfortunately, it was the closing time, therefore, I got unlucky. It was fabulous to see the sunset standing on a pier far away from the city corner and crowd and just experience the calmness around. 

Fish and Chips

The much-awaited thing anyone could do in Southend is to have fish and chips. I would say when you see it written everywhere the term just gets into your head and all you want to have is only the fish and chips. So finally after I was very tired coming back from the pier, I sat down to try Cod with mushy peas and chips. Wow! Delightful. It is just excellent when you are tired and hungry and you get to eat some delicious fish and chips. And a nice fish and chips meal will cost you around £5. 

Read More Budget Travel Stories

Kids Paradise

So, Southend is truly a kid’s paradise. It is the kid's Las Vegas that has big gaming arenas like kid-friendly casinos. I could see kids going crazy over the games where they have to insert coins to take teddy bears out. Another thing kids were enjoying was the virtual roller coaster ride. Along the road, there are also a few souvenir shops.  

Adventure Park

So this is the centre of attraction. While sitting at the beach or walking over the pier or while having cod, my only wish was to take that huge ride called Axis. Axis is a pendulum style ride that swings, spins and twists riders upside-down over 100ft in the air and it somehow drew my attention. Though there were roller coasters and other rides like Merry go round, drop tower, and different other swings, the axis was something new to me and I decided to take it. The ticket for axis was for £5. After a long wait, I finally got a chance to take a seat on the axis. It started moving in the pendulum style and then suddenly went up. It stood at 180 degrees and I was upside down and then it started revolving in that position. And as my head was hanging, I could see the roads from 100 ft above. It was way too scary. But yes, dangerous is the term for adventure rides. 

So that was all about my day in Southend-on-Sea, a beautiful town in England that has the longest pleasure pier in the world. One of the best things about London is that it has some great train connections to beachside towns in England where one can spend his/her weekend. Hence, I have more on my list and will be travelling there soon. Till then stay updated! Do check out my top ten ways to cut expenses and save money for travel. If you wish to share your budget travel story, you can get in touch with me and share your experiences. You can also subscribe to my YouTube channel and enjoy the videos of my travel.