h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

As far as I remember Norwich has some additonal remarkable features:

a) Complete lack of recommendable restaurants. At best bring your own food.
b) Its univeristy.
c) I think Lotus is located near this place. Lotus corporation makes some of the best sports cars in the world. See http://www.lotuscars.co.uk/

What about Caffe Uno, Tombland, great food, great staff. Or The Larder, Bedford Street, excellent food during the day.

Bangkok Siam (from what I remember of that evening!) is good, Mambo Jambos, The Last Wine Bar, Reads (Reids?), Any of the Nazma restaurants do the best curries in town (in my humble opinion), Italian place on St Benedicts called 'La Trattoria' is nice, Oh, they're there alright, you just have to sift through all the dross first, but that goes for anywhere you eat in this country.

As an outsider to Norich I have noticed a few things. Every single building in Norwich is owned by Norwich Union. I'm currently working in one of the four? Surrey Street offices. There is a better Thai resturant that Siam Bangkok, I forget the name though so thats no help. Pedros resturant is good, for those who like Mexican food. Don't bother with starters, the main course will feed two!

Good pubs i've found so far include the Slug and Lettuce, one of our favourites, or Ha Ha's found opposite in Tombland.

Restaurants? It's great if you like game - plenty to choose from.

Pedros, the one in the park? Is that still going?

Pedro's does indeed still exist in the park next to Chapelfield.

As far as good restaurants goes, there are plenty of local eateries that are worth a visit: The Waffle House, Ha Ha's, Charlie's... a short list here, but there's tons. I suspect many have appeared in the last 5 or 6 years, after this entry was written.

Norwich is actually a quite lovely city, with a little bit of everything. I always like to think of it as a bustling little mini-metropolis - which about sums it up perfectly.

Its a loverly lively place, when I travel there, which is useually quite a few times a year its always a nice change from Cambridge which just seems too self-centred and self-referenterial in comparason...
True Norwich, like Cambridge, heck like anywhere is suffering from the awfulness of myriad blank soulless large coorperation type joints; the big cc chain pubs, the awful chain restaurants etc.... But perhaps more in Norwich than some other areas its got a goodly measur eof small independant pubs/bars/food-outlets
And of course, the beer seems so much cheaper than here in Cambridge The Trafford arms, out a bit from the centre is a great little 'local' real ale pub, with a good selection of real ales that change regularly; plus it has a mini* beer fest at least once a year, which is actually pretty big with a huge range of beers.... Of course, there is also the main Norwich beer festavil which is great, and in that fantastic old building... The name of which I forget which is a bonus to it all
There used* to be a great little cafe near the station, not sure if that is still there; Anyone been to the new shoping centre?; I guess its just filled with vacuous 'high street' big chain stores
The Mustard shop is a little Gem hidden away too

If you mean the cafe in the train station - Bonapartes - that's turned into a Pumpkin's in the last couple months. Sad, but to be honest, Bonapartes was a getting to be a bit crap, frankly.

Which shopping area do you mean? If you mean the old Chocolate factory in town, which is now called Chapelfield's, then yeah, it's full of just the traditional high street stuff.

Norwich does, however, have quite a load of those independent pubs AND shops. They're not normally on the high street, or even on the main drag through the pedestrian area, but they are there and numerous, but sort of hidden away (I would say where they are, but I can't for the life of me remember the name of the road). There's plenty in the Arcade as well - though Waterstones and T-Mobile sort of overshadow them in presence. More visibly, there's Jarrold's, which I know is just the flagship store, but it's still a real local place, and a nice alternative to M&S/Debenham'/House of fraser/etc. Pubwise, there's also The Fat Cat (actually a 5 minute walk from me!), and lesser known places like The Unthank Arms and The Rose, which are in studenty areas but definitely not studennt pubs.

It's a great place to live and work, in my opinion. Have just fallen head over heals for the place.

Ooo forgot the Fat cat, another great real ale pub, always does well in the CamRa guides There are, I seem to recall a nice few indepedant shops and pubs etc., hidden away in some of the old streets off from near the market area and a few pubs I think if you head off from the train station, down by the river, kinda towards the Cathedral sort of direction....
The cafe I was thinking of was near* not on the station... kinda on the opposite side of the raod to the railway station Which reminds me, there is a really nice pub if you head the wrong way to the main city centre direction on that road, then, I think, turn off left at some point.... less than five mins from the station, and had a good range of real ale too I seem to recall can't remember what it was called though
Actually, whats the market like nowdays?; I remember that being pretty good; we'd often get chips off a market stall and go sit at teh top by the statue/war memorial and have fun watching the pigeons trying to nab our chips

I think I know the cafe you mean - but it had just been taken over by something else when I moved here two years ago, or at least I think it was. I don't tend to explore that end of the city much as I live on the other side of it, but now you've made me want to wander all over and find these places!

Market's the best open air market I've seen this side of the Atlantic (and I've seen quite a few!). They do everything - chips, fresh fruit, veg, and meat from the area, books, clothes, flowers, animal supplies - just everything. I was amazed when I came and saw it, and it's one of my favourite things about the city.

My absolute favourite thing, however, is Elm Hill. It's got such a lovely atmosphere, you really do feel like you've gone back in time.

Not sure if I know Elm hill, most of my trips wondering about Norwich these days are either restricted to the centre/market type area during the day, or wondering between pubs drunk late at night Oo I just remembered an Indian we went to after the last Norwich beer festavil, must have been near the venue for the festavil, think it was called the 'passage to India'
And, as my brain seems to have kicked in to remembering mode, I think the cafe was called something like 'number 10' had a brilliant pin ball machine in it Erlum road (I think), however its spelt I recall as being a lively place in the evening and I think there were a couple of decent pubs down there too
Agree about the market, makes Cambridge's market look really pitiful I recall getting some stuff from a butchers stall on Norwich market a while ago, and it being really very cheap/reasonably priced and very good to eat later on when we cooked it
Still feels a bit sad that we'll never be able to walk past the choc factory any more and have that wonderful smell of choc in the air I seem to recall students liking jobs there on the production side of things, as they could eat as much choc as they wanted whilst working
Didn't they renivate the theatre Royal a few years back; Remember very vividly going there as a young child with my parents to watch panto and such like
Norwich is also I think very well endowered with plenty of ancient Church's some of which are quite intersting, if your in to that kinda thing, wasn't it the Norwich Camping shop which was actually in an old disused church

If it interests, my take on Norwich is here:- A6172931