2024 Villa pilgrimage thread

[TomC]

I've been back from my Villa pilgrimage for almost a month. Given how much good advice I got from other pilgrimage threads, I feel obligated to give my impressions and some advice of my own. That said, I've been procrastinating. Rather than do one long post, I'm going to break it up into a bunch of smaller posts so it doesn't seem so daunting.

The moderators have created a pilgrimage tag for threads like this. So far only three threads have it. I recommend that anyone doing a pilgrimage start with this one...

Unfortunately, because it's in an old match thread, it's closed for more posts, but it's full of good advice.

A couple other threads that I found useful but that don't have the pilgrimage tag are...

 

 

[TomC]

If you're an overseas fan and you've been thinking about doing a pilgrimage, do it! I should have done it much, much sooner. It was a wonderful experience.

I will get into specifics in a later post, but first let me talk about Birmingham in general. The whole family liked it. As a tourist, there's plenty to do and we found it pleasant. I can't tell you what it's like to to live there, but some of you Brummies shouldn't be so down about your city. I've been to just about every major city in the US and Brum compares quite well. Cities have a way of giving off a vibe, and Brum seemed pretty energetic to me. I had read that Brum is known for having some awful modernist architecture after so many buildings were bombed during WWII, but we found it anything but ugly. Plenty of beautiful buildings are still around, and most of the modern stuff is no worse than the cookie-cutter concrete and glass structures you find all over American cities. (OK, the library wasn't quite my taste, but that's only one building.)

So when you do a Villa pilgrimage, don't spend most of your time in London. I'd allow at least four days in Brum. We stayed four days in London and four in Brum (from which we did a day trip to Stratford-on-Avon) and we didn't get to see everything in Brum, plus we were rushed in some other things.

 

[VillaJ100]

6 hours ago, TomC said:

If you're an overseas fan and you've been thinking about doing a pilgrimage, do it! I should have done it much, much sooner. It was a wonderful experience.

I will get into specifics in a later post, but first let me talk about Birmingham in general. The whole family liked it. As a tourist, there's plenty to do and we found it pleasant. I can't tell you what it's like to to live there, but some of you Brummies shouldn't be so down about your city. I've been to just about every major city in the US and Brum compares quite well. Cities have a way of giving off a vibe, and Brum seemed pretty energetic to me. I had read that Brum is known for having some awful modernist architecture after so many buildings were bombed during WWII, but we found it anything but ugly. Plenty of beautiful buildings are still around, and most of the modern stuff is no worse than the cookie-cutter concrete and glass structures you find all over American cities. (OK, the library wasn't quite my taste, but that's only one building.)

So when you do a Villa pilgrimage, don't spend most of your time in London. I'd allow at least four days in Brum. We stayed four days in London and four in Brum (from which we did a day trip to Stratford-on-Avon) and we didn't get to see everything in Brum, plus we were rushed in some other things.

 

Thanks for the write up! Brum survived quite well in WW2, it was a town planner called Manzoni in the 50's and 60's who decided most of the Georgian and Victorian architecture should be pulled down in favour of 'modern' ugly concrete shit. In the last 25 years a huge amount of money has been spent on the city centre trying to repair the damage.

[TomC]

On 06/05/2024 at 07:24, VillaJ100 said:

Thanks for the write up! Brum survived quite well in WW2, it was a town planner called Manzoni in the 50's and 60's who decided most of the Georgian and Victorian architecture should be pulled down in favour of 'modern' ugly concrete shit. In the last 25 years a huge amount of money has been spent on the city centre trying to repair the damage.

I do remember hearing that the city planning was atrocious and that the Queensway was the worst of it. Now that the Queensway has been broken up, it's a little confusing for a tourist until you realize that there are multiple Queensways as a result...

 

[TomC]

Next piece of advice for future pilgrims...definitely take the stadium tour. Locals might want to, too.

For whatever reason, we couldn't print our tour tickets and they wouldn't show up in the AVFC app. No worries...they have your name on a list and you can get in if you're on the list. The entrance is on the Doug Ellis stand near the North End. No harm in arriving early...when you go in, there's a bar right there and you can order a pint and snack food. You can stay after and drink/eat too.

The tour is not just "here's the locker room, here's the tunnel," etc. Our guide did a good job building the tour around the players' matchday routine and explaining the routine as you go to different parts of the stadium. There's certainly a little salesmanship involved..."this room can be rented out for weddings, parties, and business meetings!"

The highlight was definitely going out the tunnel to the pitch. You've seen it on the telly so many times, so it was cool to see it in person. Seeing the directors' suite and box was fun, too. The directors' seats are quite posh. My wife was quite happy when the guide pointed out that she was sitting in the same seat where Prince William sat on his previous visit.

I thought it was kind of cool how they preserved some of the windows from the old Trinity Road and incorporated them into various place inside the new one. Not that it absolves Deadly Doug for what he did to the old one.

You get a discount at the store afterwards (can't remember if it's 10% or 15%), so if you're planning to stock up on merch, do it when you do the tour.

If it fits your schedule, I would recommend doing the tour before a match instead of after. It's good to learn your way around before you arrive for matchday.

Anyway, it's recommended.