Slightly off beat London

The Albatross

Wednesday 26 June 2019

After a bit of a sleep in after a late-night last night, Johnny, Tuna and I caught the tube out to the National Archives in Kew, where they are doing a cold war exhibit. It was quite good, but I was hoping for some more papers about spies, covert operations and government secrets, however there were only a few of these.

After lunch Johnny had to depart due to a previous rendezvous, so Tuna and I headed into London centre, to see the very quirky Sir John Soane’s Museum. It basically lots of old bit and pieces he collected over the years, such as old bits of statues, models of temples, bits of cornice, paintings and even a sarcophagus, all arranged seemingly a bit randomly in a bizarre warren of a self-designed house, with weird views, windows and angles. Unfortunately you aren’t allowed to take photos but there is lots online.

Next we strolled down over the Themes and went and had a look at the graffiti tunnel under Waterloo Station, which was pretty decent.

Sore feet eventually won out, and we departed back to Johnny and Bridget’s to plan tomorrow. We failed to do this, however, we did have a lovely meal at one of the local pubs.

Damp drive, pink cab and a pub crawl

Tuna

Tuesday 25 June 2019

Today was a driving day, Cardiff to London. It started with rain, so we got wet packing the car. The M4 crosses the River Severn about half an hour out of Cardiff on the Prince of Wales Bridge. Big bridge and rather cool. (I’ve just read that the bridge used to be called the Second Severn Crossing and was a toll road. It recently became toll free and its name was changed to the Prince of Wales Bridge in recognition of the man turning 70 and being prince for 50 years.)

We drove in rain for a couple of hours and then tried to get some lunch in Reading. We read online that there was tapestry worth having a look at in Reading and it was coincided with lunchtime. However, as we came off the M4 the traffic stopped. After 15 mins (and 500m) we worked out that roadworks on the main road in had caused the stoppage. We chose to abandon the visit to Reading and had a chicken burger in Burger King. Honestly it was the best of all the choices.

Into London, one false turn (my fault) and we dropped off the car. Now we just had to find a cab to get us to Johnny and Bridget’s. Luckily one was coming down the road and it stopped. It was pink, not sure why, but it was completely pink. Anyway, it got us to where we needed to go.

Dumped our stuff (quite messily) in our beautifully newly painted room and made the place look shabby. It was decided it would be a good idea to wander down the road for a refreshing pint. So, off The Albatross, Johnny and I toddled and found that the pint was refreshing and delicious. There ensured a pub crawl around the neighbourhood to a few (five) of the favourite local pubs. Eventually it was time to stagger home, dinner had to be cooked and the hardworking Bridget was due to arrive. We may have drunk a few more bottles of wine and some whisky and gone to bed at midnight.

Cardiff – the next bit

The Albatross

Monday 24 June 2019

As I’m a bit of an idiot, I forgot that many museums don’t open on Mondays, so the supposedly excellent Cardiff museum will go unexplored. Instead we fortified ourselves with a fish finger butty and tackled Cardiff Castle instead (hopefully the last for a little while). It was a castle, most of it hadn’t fallen down. It’s party trick was that the Marquis of Bute glammed the place up in the late 1800’s and employed William Burges to turn it into this sort of Medieval leisure palace. Think Kryal Castle, but with a lot more money behind it. They’d obviously had a big event there yesterday which they were packing up, so it was a tad hard to walk around and a tad noisy.

They had used the passageway in the walls as air raid shelters in WWII, and there was a section left to give you a feel for what it was like.

Off for a late lunch at a place we’d researched. A fabulous 3 course elegant Italian meal. We waddled out a couple of hours later and had a wander through the market and picked up supplies for dinner, which might be quite late tonight.

Cardiff

Tuna

Sunday 23 June 2019

You don’t really want to stay in Milford Haven, there is nothing there. Following on from last night’s experience where over half of the beers on tap were out and that they didn’t have any cold bottles of their white wine which was their advertised special, this morning we couldn’t get an espresso as the coffee machine is broken!! Flabbergasted.

We had planned a nice gentle drive down the A40, A48 and M4 to Cardiff, with a quick stop in Swansea to have a look at the old copper factory. It looked interesting on their website. However, when we got there all the information panels had been vandalised in some way, everything was covered in 1.5m high weeds and half the stuff was behind a locked gate. Their website advertised that you could do a leisurely stroll around and read about the history as you go. We left after 5mins.

Today has been very overcast, wet and drizzly. A bit like Melbourne only warmer. After asking politely, we were allowed to check into our apartment at 1pm (rather than 3pm). This meant we could park the car, unpack and then stroll out to lunch. Our apartment is half way between the city and the waterfront We headed off to the waterfront and to have a nice lunch.

A nice lunch was had, sitting inside, out of the rain, looking over the bay.

A quick visit to Ianto’s Shrine ….

Next stop was the Senedd building which is home to the National Assembly for Wales (the devolved parliament for Wales). The building is stunning.

Although it is essentially parliament house for Wales, it is open to the public every day and entry is free. You have to go through a security check but you are greeted by four very happy and chirpy bullet-proof vest wearing security guards. Once inside another very happy and chirpy person greets you and tell you a bit of history of the building. But he was happy to answer all types of questions, even one on Brexit. The main chamber is circular so there are no sides. In the middle on the floor is huge circular piece of art, Heart of Wales, which represents the Welsh population and in the middle is the Senedd.

The idea behind the design of the Senedd building was to make it accessible to the public and for parament to be transparent. I would say they have achieved this not only through the design of the building but also the lovely friendly people that work there.

We wandered back through Roald Dahl Plass, named after the Cardiff born writer, to check out the Torchwood entrance and the amazing looking Wales Millennium Centre.

The Welsh are lovely people and all the ones we’ve met so far have just been so cheerful and nice, even when you have to tell your landlady that there seems to be water leaking through the en-suite ceiling light.

We’re on a road to nowhere

The Albatross

Saturday 22 June 2019

Today was a long driving day that got a bit longer than intended when our GPS took a short cut. We were just heading south down through Snowdonia to the Southern Welsh Coast. There is a decent A road, which whilst still twisty and slow, is drivable. However, the GPS found a short cut over a mountain on extremely narrow windy roads. It was pretty, but there are no photos as there was nowhere to stop. Tuna was driving (very well) and I was trying not to make panicky noises as trees and walls passed cm’s from my head. Eventually the short cut ended and we just had to deal with caravans (there are caravan parks everywhere here, and they seem pretty damn full) and slow-moving objects.

We thought we’d grab a coffee in Aberystwyth which was a tremendously poor decision. It was a beautiful sunny Saturday and everyone was out, cars everywhere, people walking down the road as the pavements were chockers and parking nightmarish. We eventually found a spot at a supermarket and joined the throng. It has a pretty seafront, but that’s all that’s here. The coffee was mediocre but better than that we had with breakfast (although the breakfast was great).

Down the much-improved road through rolling country side for a late lunch at Cardigan (it was a big breakfast). A lovely bowl of chowder down by the river was lovely and quiet and calmed the soul a little.

Then the final haul to Milford Haven down in Pembrokeshire. It’s a small little port town (has been since the Middle Ages). There nothing much here, but it’s only one night. The poor bartender is on his own and there is a throng in. He is drowning massively, but it does slow the beer intake.

Welsh engineering structures

Tuna

Friday 21 June 2019

Time to go to a different country, Welsh-land here we come. We’ve heard some good things about this place from some Welsh people. Despite their comments, so far, the weather has been stunning and sunny and I haven’t yet spotted the bleakness

First stop was the seaside town of Llandudno, which seems to be the Victorian era seaside resort town. The main promenade is full to gorgeous Victoria villas. However, we weren’t here to do the seaside and arcade thing, we were here to see the big hill, the large rock, The Great Orme, there was nowhere to park anyway. I asked The Albatross what is was exactly and he compared it to The Nut in Stanley, Tasmania. Despite that, it was really quite pretty with great views across the Irish Sea to look at the horizon, wind farms and apparently Isle of Man was out there somewhere too. There are a number of ways to get to the top, walk, drive, tram, cable car, teleport.

We decided to have an early lunch at the café on the summit. We walked drove up here so might as well enjoy the sights. However, the hot food wasn’t served until 12noon. This meant that all we could get to eat was cake, eclairs, pure sugar in the disguise of food. The café was full of old people eating sugar and drinking tea. We walked next door and got a beer, admired the view and waited for noon to arrive.

Back down the hill and off to Bangor to look at the engineering marvels, bridges. However, along the way we experienced some long tunnels. Really exciting. :-)

First bridge was the Menai Suspension Bridge built by Thomas Telford. Great looking bridge designed to stop cows drowning on the way to the mainland.

Just up the river, 1km, is the Britannia Bridge designed by Robert Stephenson. It is a tubular bridge made of iron rectangular boxes all put together. The main point of the bridge was so a train could service the island and provide a link (by sea) to Dublin. They eventually put a road on top so you could also drive across it in a car.

So, suitable impressed by the engineering feats of Wales, we came to Caernarfon. The local highlights in town is the roman walls and Caernarfon Castle.  We have a lovely room in a pub for the night which is inside the roman walls. Rather cool.

We went for a wander around town and the castle and has a cider in the lovely sunshine. I don’t know why everyone says the weather is bad in this place. We have had lots of sunshine.