Do you want the good news or the bad news first? Bad news? Always better to get the negativity out of the way first, and cheer yourself up with the good news after. Okay, well the bad news is that we're still weeks if not months away from getting any new The Real Housewives of Cheshire on our screens.
The good news, however, is that when we finally do get them, we'll be watching the milestone ten-year anniversary series of the show, which we now know will include following the ladies as they start the celebrations in Thailand.
And if the drama's anything like the time the TOWIE lot jetted off to Thailand, well, we're in for something special. Oh, we'll get to how we know they're in Thailand – other than being pretty darn stellar at our jobs – in two secs.
The ladies (we've clocked Rachel Lugo, Lystra Adams, Lauren Simon, Sheena Lynch, Eleanor Egar, Paige Chohan, Seema Malhotra and Nicole Sealey on the trip so far) and the production crew began their 17-hour trip to an undisclosed girls trip location over the weekend and, of course, the Instagram story content has been coming in fast and furious.
And while the ladies have clearly been told not to give up the glamorous location of the trip (Paige even said she couldn't reveal anything in a recent story), Housewives Sheena and Lauren have struggled to keep the surprise under wraps. In addition to much of the girls' recent story footage showing off stunning landscapes that are very much giving Thailand, Sheena wrote 'good morning' in Thai on her story this morning, while Lauren literally showed us a beachside view before panning the camera round to say, 'Thailand'.
It does also seem that part-time Housewives Tanya Bardsley and Ampika Pickston are not part of the trip (unless they're joining at a later stage/actually following their Non Disclosure Agreements). We also know that the majority of the animosity that caused an almighty cast divide last season appears to have healed (or at least shelved for the sake of the trip). By the looks of their social media content over the last couple of days, everyone seems to be getting along swimmingly.
Actually, saying that, while it appears that the likes of Rachel and Lystra have called it a day on their feud, we're yet to see Lauren and Paige together on anyone's socials (following their raging feud which reached boiling point at the last reunion), which no doubt means one word: storyline. It's The Real Housewives of Cheshire, after all.
We also know that production have begun filming two months earlier than normal (regular series usually film in January), which in our minds means we might be getting more episodes in series 18.
The Housewives have been teasing the long-anticipated ten-year anniversary series for months now. In September, Closer caught up with Tanya and Lauren at The NTAs , who teased, 'It's going to be series 18 and we're going to be celebrating the 10 year anniversary as well.'
Lauren added, 'So, everything is happening. We are hopefully going on holiday, we're going to party. You might see some old faces, you're definitely going to see some new faces.'
Interestingly, Tanya revealed just a few weeks ago that filming was set to start in January 2025, so it appears the December girls trip is somewhat of a last-minute production decision.
WATCH: Real Housewives of Cheshire's Tanya Bardsley and Lauren Simon spill the beans on the ten-year anniversary series
Ben Pulsford is a digital writer for Bauer Media, writing for both Closer online and heatworld. When he's not getting paid to gossip about Big Brother, Love Island and The Real Housewives of Cheshire, he's storming the London LGBTQ+ scene as drag queen, Beary Poppins. Both Ben and Beary are awaiting an invite to join The Real Housewives of Cheshire for series 18. The budget's not there, but the drama is 💅.