Day 1: Cardiff
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| Yes it's cold. I'm wrapped up like a dumpling =) |
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| The circle of stones in Wales, typically left behind after a musical gathering |
The capital of Wales and full of surprises.
I expected a sleepy town and found a vibrant bustling city instead.
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| St Mary streets full of pubs and shopping |
As the flight is early, i got hungry and went for lunch first before doing more sightseeing. Alan gave me a list of food to try and shepherd's pie is first to get checked off.
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| Lunch with Shepherd pie and Bill's cider |
Cardiff Castle
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiff_Castle
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| Front of the Cardiff castle showing clock tower on the left |
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| The castle grounds inside |
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| The north of the castle where the red castle can be seen at 12 oclock direction |
This castle reveals the intelligence of the 3rd Marquee of Bute that put Cardiff on the world's map. All the marquess are called John Stuart (I guess it makes naming babies easier)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marquess_of_Bute
The family rebuilt the castle on top of Roman ruins and Norman shell. The marquess has bathrooms with indoor plumbing that's way before it is common. He also built the Cardiff port.
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| The main hall of the castle, where you can rent it cheaper than a hotel ballroom for events |
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| Indoor Plumbing in the bathroom |
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| Stunning library where every piece is an antique in design and workmanship |
Day 2 in Cardiff
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| A cup of coffee (bigger than my face) to warm me up! |
Since Cardiff is so cold and vast, it's impossible to walk to sights easily. So the 2nd day i took the open top bus to hop on/off for 1 day and see the sights of Cardiff.
https://city-sightseeing.com/en/88/cardiff/252/hop-on-hop-off-cardiff?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&gclid=EAIaIQobChMInMWSpoWe1wIVpDLTCh3zRgEUEAAYASAAEgLVWPD_BwE
The guide in the first bus is highly amusing with the English humor =)
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| Note how the guide is dressed? hint that even the bus is cold! |
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| The city Hall with the Welsh dragon on top (not in the pic unfortunately) |
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| Lovely garden with a John Stuart statue (i think the 3rd Marquess |
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| The millionaire row of houses |
One thing i learned is that all the museums in Wales are free! It's staggering to walk into the city museum and see 6 Monets for free.
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| 6 Monets side by side! My favourite painter |
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| Lovely collection of tea pots and porcelain! another eye candy |
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| Wales Millenium center (by the waters) |
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| High tea at the Pettigrew Tea room. Great cream! |
Day 3: Brecon Beacons
http://www.breconbeacons.org/
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| The mid valley of Beacons |
Reading about Cardiff, one suggested day trip is to go to Beacons for the day. I arranged for a private guide Evans to bring me around as it's low tourist season.
Not a lot of tours are available. He turns out to be very pleasant and it's a nice way to see the valleys.
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| Evans and his taxi |
First is i got lucky that the weather was beautiful (aka the sun is out!) =)
What is amazing for me is how quickly the scenery change from a uber urban city life to rolling hills and sheeps! And the Welsh countryside is beautiful!
I was expecting a US national park wilderness and quickly realized i'm wrong.
Brecon have a lot of micro towns separated by mountains. And each town has reservoirs and water treatment plant.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pontsticill_Reservoir
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| Pontsticii Reservoir |
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| Another beautiful reservoir |
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| Another way of collecting and filtering water |
Evans also told me that you can rent a boat for 2 weeks and motor up and down the canals in the region. An interesting way to travel for sure. But beware of the narrow bridges!
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| Entire region connected by canals and small bridges |
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| The view of Brecon town |
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| Ice cream stop for the day at Llanfeasdairy |
Our lunch stop for the day is at this lovely sugarloaf vineyard
http://sugarloafvineyard.co.uk/
Evans's mum work there and she's very lovely. Had a great grilled cheese and ham sandwich made locally for the ham and cheese, on top of a cheese and meat platter. Also had wine tasting at the vineyard. It is interesting wine as the grapes are picked earlier due to the cold weather and hence the wine is lighter!
The estate is beautiful and looks like they rent cottages for tours too!
After lunch i learned about mining and steel industry in Wales. High quality Wales iron is coupled with a harsh working environment, and it is seen how all the elements for a successful industrial area is all around Brecon. I didn't get a good picture of the big pit as it was raining too hard.
http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/984
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| Unesco site |
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| The iron mine |
Day 3: Bristol
I screwed up my bus ticket to Bristol and in the end i only got 4 hours in Bristol. The most efficient way was to see Bristol with another hop on/off bus in the short amount of time. So i end up going 2 rounds of the bus in the cold taking pictures of the city =)
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| Bristol Hop on/off bus |
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| Barbara our guide is entertaining and fun |
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| St Mary's Cathedral |
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| USS Great Britain in Bristol |
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| Central train station |
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| Clifton Suspension Bridge |
What is fun for me in Bristol is the cartoons and comics and graffiti.
Barbara said that there's a Gromit the dog trail! Looking it up, it seems that there's one planned for every year. It's quite funny that it's probably adults dragging their kids along as this is such an old cartoon!
http://www.gromitunleashed.org.uk/news/new-arts-trail-planned-2018-bristol
In case you are wondering why Gromit is there, Aardman animations is there and the bus go by their office. Their windows has the penguin and Gromit!
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| Hello Gromit |
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| One of the garage nearby showing "No laughing" on one side and "No Barking" on the other |
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| The Graffiti of Bristol |
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| More food checked off : Fish&Chips, Welsh cake, Cornish pasties |
After lunch, we stopped for Vivoli Ice cream
