Wales

This weekend I went to Wales with some friends--Nate, Lindsey, and King. We took a train from London to Swansea, a medium sized coastal town and the home town of Dylan Thomas, a famous poet (the one, supposedly, after whom Bob Dylan took the 'Dylan' part of his name). They had a couple museums, one of which we went to. It was okay. The more interesting parts of the city were the bay area by the beach and the Dylan Thomas exhibition. We had a nice lunch at a restaurant called The Pumphouse right next to the Marina. There we experienced a special dish in Wales called Beef & Brains (the 'Brains' referring to a brand of beer used for flavouring). Anyway, it was nice.



After wandering around Swansea for a while, we jumped back on the train and headed to Cardiff where we met up with my dear friend Kate. In Cardiff, we stopped by the Hard Rock Cafe and then made our way to the Cardiff Castle. The castle was really neat and it was nice to have a guided tour to give us some background on the history and such. It would also have been nice to be able to just wander, as we only got to see a small portion of the entire thing. The rooms were so elaborate. Every detail was a symbol for something or captured some sort of historical or cultural factoid. For example, the children's play room had drawings of all the classic children's stories etched on the walls and on the light fixtures. It was pretty impressive.



After exploring the Castle and swording around in the gift shop, we reunited with Lindsey (she didn't want to see the castle), and then headed to find food and drinks. We walked for quite a while and eventually found a place that had really cheap drinks, but no luck on the food. King and Lindsey had to head back to London, so we said farewell, and then Kate, Nate and I enjoyed some of the local nightlife before making our way back to the Cardiff Backpacker's hostel where we were staying for the night.

Sunday morning began with breakfast in the hostel lounge for Kate, Nate, and I. After checkout, we took a Stagecoach bus from Cardiff to Caerphilly (about 15-20 minutes or so) to visit Caerphilly Castle (pronounded Ca-filly). It was also very interesting to check out. It felt so peaceful and quiet to be there, too, especially after being in the busy city of London for the past few weeks. It was a nice break from the city and it was enjoyably educational, as well. After spending the majority of the day at the castle and trying to figure out the bus schedule, we finally took a cab back to Cardiff. We had dinner at the Prince of Wales restaurant and then caught the train back to London. It was a very nice weekend away.

Tower of Caerphilly Castle


Me at Caerphilly Castle