Day 5

Friday 6/12/09
Today started out with a trip to Ty Mawr which is the house of the man who first translated the bible into welsh. It was a lovely drive to get there; unfortunately when we did we found that they were not open. So we took some pictures of the outside, and walked through their gardens. They had so many different colors of columbine, it was really beautiful. We next visited a Neolithic Burial Chamber, which was a short walk through some farmers field, careful not to step on any of the land mines that the sheep had left. The chamber was really quite impressive considering it had been there since roughly 2000BC. A cute and quirky local sheep dog showed up, and followed us around. He was more then happy to have Morgan throw a stick for him. Next we went to Harlech Castle, which was quite amazing. While we were there a group of kids from the Welsh Ballet Institute was practicing choreography for A Midsummer Nights Dream in the main green. Next we tried to find a place to grab some lunch… and what did we find, but an Aldi’s! It was great, we got food for lunch, dinner (with wine) and breakfast the next day for less then the cost of eating lunch out. Next we went to Portmerion which is a little village which is designed to look like an Italian village. They had a number of shops and trails to walk through the gardens. We then stopped at Criccieth Castle which is right on the ocean. It was much more ruined then many of the other castles we had visited. Mostly it was just a foundation; there weren’t any towers or rooms to explore. There were however cute little plants all over growing out of the walls, quite amazing. This evening has been relaxed, we made dinner, had some down time to blog, and read, and soon it will be time for bed. Today was really great.

Day 4

Thursday 6/11/09
I am actually writing this entry Friday morning, because yesterday was such a jam packed day that Morgan and I got back to the Eagles and just collapsed into bed. The day started by waking up and realizing that for the first time in Wales we had blue sky and sunshine. We went to Tintern Abby first, and it was absolutely magnificent. The ruins were absolutely impressive, and massive. From there we went to Roman Baths, and a Roman forum in Caerleon. From there we went to Tredegar house and took a tour. The house was once home to the Morgan lineage, so it was fun to visit and speculate about Morgan’s potentially distant cousins. The house has been restored to its previous splendor, and was really amazing to see. We found out in the 4th room that we weren’t allowed to take pictures, but we had taken some before we were told we shouldn’t. Morgan was happy that he was able to get a picture of the Morgan family crest before they outlawed photography. From there we went to the St. Fagan’s Museum of Welsh National History. It was meant to be something like visiting colonial Williamsburg in the states, there were various housed from different periods of Welsh history which had been decorated from that time period, and there were people in costume within those houses able to answer questions about the time period. Unfortunately there was some movie that was using several of the houses as part of a filming set, so the Museums actors were tied up as extras. It felt very strange exploring what felt like an abandoned village for the most part, looking through windows to see the decor of the house. From there we proceeded to drive 4 hours north to get back to the Eagles Bunkhouse. The drive was absolutely spectacular because of the clear skies we could see hills in the distance, and the sun lit up amazing vistas. We even saw the sun set ( at 9:40pm). We stopped at an Inn called The Unicorn for dinner, and I have to say that I got very frustrated with my dinner. I was feeling kinda tired from our jam packed day, and was looking for some comfort food for dinner, so I ordered the Lasagna. Unfortunately their idea of lasagna was undrained ground beef, noodles and a little cheese melted on top… absolutely no tomato sauce! It was quite disgusting! But other then that the day was lovely. Now off to another adventure.

Pictures

Decided it's not worth waiting to post my pictures till I get home. Posting a small smattering on Morgans Picasa.

A Series of Unfortunate Events

Wednesday 6/10/09
Today was a series of unfortunate events. The morning started with a high stress car ride in which we got lost driving down narrow single lane roads which apparently support 2 way traffic. We then found a lovely spot to pull over and have the breakfast we had packed from the night before. Breakfast was scones and juice. The spot we picked had an absolutely gorgeous view of mountains and a pond, but when we got out of the car we were swarmed by so many bugs that it could have been described as one of the plagues of Egypt. I hopped back into the car immediately, of course about 100 bugs made it in with me. I motioned frantically for Morgan to get back in the car, but he was busy taking pictures and swatting at the sea of bugs that had engulfed him. So I proceeded to try and swat as many bugs as I could inside the car, because opening a window would have only let more in. Finally he got back in the car, bringing hundreds more bugs with him, and we sped away opening all the windows in hopes that the bugs would be swept away in the vortex of wind. It worked for the most part, and we cleared the air in the car. We stopped at another nice overlook further down the road, and were smart enough to keep the windows shut while we ate our breakfast. I took a bite of the scone, which was really very good, but a bit dry, so I took a big swig of the black current/apple juice that we had purchased. BLECK! It was all I could do not to spit it from my mouth! As it turns out Morgan and I had purchased a liter bottle of black current/apple juice concentrate… we apparently should have been diluting it at a 5:1 ratio with water. It simply never occurred to us that they would sell liquid concentrate in a liter bottle… honestly who needs 5 liters of juice?
Next item of business in the day was getting mildly lost again, but that was easily fixed and we were on our way to see the tallest waterfall in the UK, even boasting to be 40 ft taller then Niagara Falls. The waterfall was stunning, and the weather cooperated for us to see it. It had been foggy all morning and was just starting to clear by this point. After seeing the waterfall we decided to buy some water and attempt to dilute our juice so that we could drink it. I didn’t trust the steadiness of my hands to poor from a 1 liter bottle into a tall 2.5 liter bottle without spilling, so Morgan being the gentleman, did it for me… then he handed me the bottle… I attempted to take a sip, instead the bottle slipped, seeing it as if in slow motion I grabbed the bottle to catch it, and because of the force with which I squeezed it I ended up catching the bottle, but I also wore about a quarter of the contents. Soaking wet, and sticky I realized that part of what had gotten soaked was my watch. Perfect.
Next we drove south trying to find Reglan Castle which was suppose to be our next stop. Along the way it started raining, so much so that, as the evening news later reported it there was “freak flooding” in several counties. There was also a significant hail storm that we drove through which not only coated the road in ice, but also made the grass look like it had been snowing in June…. Nothing we New Yorkers can’t handle. Once we got to Reglan Castle the rain once again intensified. We were almost literally the only tourists in the place. We tromped around in rain coats, and actually had quite a lot of fun, splashing in puddles like kids.
Next we had planned to visit an Abby but given the number of ‘unexpected detours’ that we had taken that day the Abby was closed before we even left the castle. So we attempted to find our way to our new hotel for the night. We got quite lost, went in the wrong direction for almost 20 minutes to cover one mile in rush our traffic, and finally found our hotel. The hotel is blessedly nicer than anticipated, they don’t have bunk beds, they actually have hot showers, and they have internet access, what more could a girl ask for? So now it’s off to bed, wondering what excitement is in store for tomorrow. Despite all the strange and frustrating things that have managed to happen, I still am having fun, and I’m glad I’m here enjoying all this with my husband.

Morgan has been able to post pictures up to his Picasa, since we're using his computer we haven't been able to post pictures to my Picasa.

Day 2

Tuesday 6/9/09
Today started without a bang… we got up early after sleeping fairly well, but when we went to town we found that nothing really opens early, including the first two stops on our itinerary for the day. The second stop was kind enough to let us do the audio tour early. So we spent part of the morning exploring an old mineral spring, and accompanying bath house. We then went and explored Bodnant Gardens which were absolutely stunning. There was even a live peacock there occasionally cawing at us, and puffing out his feathers. There were many trails to follow, and we took almost every one of them. We had lunch in a café which overlooked the gardens. Overall we had a great time. We then went on to Conwy where we saw Plas Mawr which is an old Elizabethan house which has been restored. We tried to see Conwy Castle, but apparently they stop letting people in at 4:30pm. It seems a lot of places open late and close early here. All I can say is it must be nice. So we went and saw a local waterfall, and then took a stroll through an abandoned churches grave yard. Tomorrow we’ll be exploring Wales to the south, should be interesting. On that note, I’m off to bed.

Made it to Wales!

Monday 6/8/09
This is the end of a very long day. It is almost 8pm here which means that we have been mostly awake for 32 hours. I say mostly, because there were scattered 15-30 minute naps on the plane that weren’t interrupted by turbulence or people squirming in their seats. We managed to navigate Dublin airport quite well, and had no trouble catching our bus to Dún Laoghaire. Once there however we started to run out of steam. The weather outside was not cooperating for exploring the village on foot so we took refuge in a coffee shop, and whiled away a few hours until it was time to take the ferry to Holyhead. The trip went smoothly from there; we arrived in Wales and got our rental car. I held my breath when we first started driving on the left hand side of the road, but I was relatively quickly relaxed by Morgan’s skills. He has done a great job driving, and has yet to screw up and turn incorrectly or drive in the wrong lane as I would have undoubtedly done. We arrived in Betsey Y cowed just in time to check into our room and get dinner. Our room however was where we hit a minor snag. Instead of being an inn like it was described online, The Eagles is actually a ‘bunk house’ which means that the only sleeping accommodations that they have are bunk beds. Not exactly what we planned. Other minor snags include that breakfast is not in fact included and that you have to rent towels if you want to shower. Much less like the bed and breakfast that I had pictured, but I can’t complain much because the countryside here is more beautiful then expected, and it makes up for the less then expected sleeping arrangements. Now I’m off to bed to see if a full night of sleep leads to better things in the morning.

Hair Cut

I've been meaning to post this for about a week now, but I haven't gotten around to it. So here it is, the before and after shots. Fourteen inches donated to Locks of Love.