To and In Caernarfon

July 4th (Fri) - Breakfast at our Aberystwyth hotel was the usual. The unusual thing about it was that it was held in the basement even though they had a much nicer ground floor dining room that looked out over the ocean. We felt like we were dining at a conference venue and it was a bit chilly as well. Despite the less than cheery surroundings, the people were very pleasant. When we checked out, I remarked to the grandmotherly lady at the desk on the great view we had had from our room and she said, “I’m not one of those landladies that says there’s a view and then you get a sliver; if I say there’s a view, that’s what you get!” She was so cute!

I wanted to walk along the water before we left town, so we walked a little ways in the opposite direction from the night before. I still can’t get over how large the seagulls are here. They are really bigger than some cats and if one went head to head with Ernie, well I think Ernie would be the one to run away! I could have walked for longer than we did because I do love to watch the water, but at one point we ran out of sand and had to edge a long a ledge to keep the incoming tide away from our shoes until we could get back up on the street. After that, we decided it was time to get on the road, and our first stop was the National Library of Wales. Here there were supposed to be old books in Welsh, including the first one ever printed, on exhibit. When we got there, we were greeted by the security guard in Welsh (bore da or “good morning”; pronounced “boray da”). This boded well for a good Welsh language experience for Mike and so it proved, as everyone was speaking Welsh there. We later learned that those individuals who interact with the public at the library must speak Welsh, it being the – ahem – NATIONAL library of WALES!! (I had mentioned this to Mike when he remarked on the amount of Welsh we were hearing; didn’t come as a surprise to ME!). In any case, we saw an exhibit entitled “Protest”, which was all about various uprisings and other events in the interest of getting Welsh officially recognized, among other things. This included seeing the actual printing press used to publish the first book in Welsh. We also saw a photo journalism exhibit on life in a town formerly dedicated to coal mining, which is very poor now that the mining is gone; it was called “Coal Faces”. There was also quite a large “Costume” exhibit that showcased traditional women’s clothing in Wales. I think “costume” actually meant the types of drawings and paintings on show, which in many cases were really wonderful watercolors of women in various traditional outfits from different areas of Wales. They also had some actual clothes on display including the Welsh hat that many women wore, a type of man’s tall black hat (stovepipe?). Finally, we made it to the book exhibit, which ended up not having the books we came to see but the ones they did have were interesting to look at. According to one of the security guards, the books are rotated in and out quite frequently, so you’re not guaranteed to see any particular one at any one time. Still, we enjoyed the visit – and actually ended up having spent a couple of hours there, particularly as Mike (while waiting for me at one point) began talking with the woman who runs the gift shop, who told us a lot about the use of the Welsh language today.

From there, we went on to Devil’s Bridge, which we had passed on the way in. I really wanted to see it and Mike was a good sport and agreed to backtrack the 12 miles or so that it took to get there. Devil’s Bridge is actually 3 bridges built on atop the other with the oldest built in the 11th century by monks, the middle one in the 17th century, and then the modern one is the last. There are falls there as well (hence the need for bridges) and you can walk down many steps to see both the falls and the bridges, which we did. Both were really something to see. When Mike asked if I wanted to walk down all those steps, I said “how many chances do you get to see an 11th century bridge” and down we went!

From here on out, we traveled the route suggested by our nice Welsh restaurant owner of the previous night. This entailed going around several peninsulas on the coast with amazing views once again, but still quite different from what we’d seen in Cornwall. Here we were seeing lots of rivers that emptied into the sea, with long stretches of sandy beaches (in Cornwall they’re all pebble beaches) that had virtually no one on them. I ached to stop and walk along them but time dictated otherwise. Seeing the library and Devil’s Bridge meant we hadn’t left Aberystwyth until around noon, and at this point we still had a ways to go before Caernarfon. In the end we made time to stop for lunch in Barmouth (fish and chips and ice cream) and at Harlech Castle, but had to cut out Portmeirion, Porthmadog, and the Lleyn peninsula so we wouldn’t be arriving in Caernarfon later than we wanted to. Originally Mike hadn’t wanted to drive at night (and I don’t blame him) but it turns out that it doesn’t really get dark here ‘til after 9PM and sometimes not really dark at all. Also, Mike has been handling the driving like a pro (I’d still be a quivering blob of jelly if it were me), so it was more a question of not wanting to be so long on the road. Harlech was definitely worth the stop and we enjoyed rambling around the substantial ruins of the castle. Harlech is way up on a cliff and used to have the ocean meeting it at the bottom, so it was pretty much impregnable on that side. Now the coast is quite a ways away; and it amazed me to see how much the water has receded over the hundreds of years it’s been standing there (construction was begun in 1283). Many of the castles in Wales were actually built by the English (Edward I in particular) to control the Welsh, but some of them were captured by the Welsh to ward off the English (and back and forth more than once in some cases). We rambled about for an hour or so here and then finished our drive into Caernarfon.

Our B&B in Caernarfon was inside the original walled city, right near the Castle itself. In fact, at one time our B&B owner had stairs that led from her house directly onto the castle wall, but she had to take them down for repairs. By traveling round and round a bit in the car, we eventually found where we were staying, but we were back to narrow streets and no parking. We called our B&B to find out where to pack and the owner very kindly said she’d come out and move her car so we could park there. In the end, there was another space free by the time we made the loop back round and Mike had the pleasure (not) of parallel parking in a space the size of half a postage stamp on a street not much wider than that. After that harrowing experience, the B&B owner gave us two beers on the house! The rooms here were very nicely done and she’d clearly tried to think of every little thing that would make a guest feel welcome. The place was called the “Victoria House” but it was elegantly done and not at all frilly like you might imagine; our room was done up in reach creams and reds with candelabra-type lamps and a silky cream and gold duvet. Very comfy and nice to look at. The only thing was that she (and her mom, who was as cute and charming as could be) was not Welsh – we think maybe Irish. I think Mike would have been thrilled if they had been Welsh speakers but they were not.

After checking in, we mellowed in our room by splitting on of our beers and then ventured out to take a peek at the Castle and to look for food. In the end, we found most places were either closed or were serving heavier meals than we were in the mood for. There doesn’t seem to be places in the towns we’ve been stopping in where you can just get something light and/or something to take home. In the end, we got tired from walking around and our long day on the road, and opted to grab some snacks from the local “tobacconist” and head back to the room to finish our other beer. Back at our room, we could hear Ollie, the owner’s terrier, outside squeaking his little toy and that made me miss Ernie. I hope he’s not missing us too terribly and getting plenty of snuggles from Tracey. I fell asleep thinking of home.

July 5th (Sat) – Breakfast this morning had more options than usual and I ended up having a fruit salad with actual fresh fruit and some pancakes. The latter weren’t really like the pancakes I’m used to (they were small and sort of hard), but it was still a nice break from the usual selection of food. Mike had warm croissants and yogurt and muesli. On our way out after breakfast, we asked the owner where the laundrette was as I needed to wash a pair of pants (I’m not used to wearing a single pair so long and I wore both pairs I brought with me not realizing that when we do laundry, I’ll need to be wearing one that won’t get washed. Duh.) She began telling us how to get there and then said “Why don’t I just toss it in with my laundry? I’ve got loads to do anyway and you’ve just got one pair.” See? Nice people.

It turns out that if you walk the streets of Caernarfon, you can hear Welsh being spoken everywhere. It far outnumbers the amount of English you hear and you even hear very young children speaking it. Needless to say, Mike was in 7th heaven. THIS was why we had come to Wales and so the agenda for the day was simply to walk around and soak it all up. After all our driving, we were getting tired of the car and while a day in town meant missing nearby sites (like Anglesey and Conwy and other places), we needed the day to simply relax. As the weather couldn’t decide what it wanted to do, it rained in fits and starts and it was much better to be in the town – able to head to our room to get out of the rain – than driving in it or getting wet elsewhere. Our first stops of the morning were the two Welsh language bookstores that we had spotted the evening before. Neither of them carried the sort of linguistics books that Mike was looking for but he had fun browsing and in the second one we talked a bit with one of the young women tending the store – a Welsh speaker of course. She mentioned that by numbers, there are more Welsh speakers down in the South in the big cities in Cardiff and Swansea as compared to the North, but down there that’s only like 2% of the population, whereas here it’s like 80% of the population. She also mentioned that it’s the “ugly” villages that tend to have the larger concentration of Welsh speakers because the pretty ones get diluted by tourists who end up staying.

After this, as the weather was at that moment rain-free, we decided to take in the castle. Turns out it was Veteran’s Day for the Welsh (the Royal Welsh Fusiliers) and there were big doings at the castle. We were still able to go in and wander around, but surrounded by all sorts of soldiers in uniforms of various types – young, old, mostly men, some women. We could also hear military bands playing at various points, and although it was a bit crowded for me, it was a fitting background for a visit to Caernarfon Castle. At one point, a Spitfire (?) – an airplane – strafed the castle several times in salute, I guess, and the first pass was so sudden and loud that even one of the seagulls on the castle wall was startled enough to fall off the wall! It was funny to see that even seagulls can be startled enough to consequently look very silly. Caernarfon Castle was also built by the English to subdue the Welsh, I think by the same builder hired by Edward I to build Harlech. It had more of its bits and pieces intact than Harlech and was also substantially larger. Lots of things to ramble about on and I spent some time imagining what life would have been like living in such a place and in such a time. As with Harlech, there were great views from atop the castle walls and towers out to the bay and beyond. Joey would really have liked all these castles and I know he and Mike would have enjoyed taking them in together – racing up and down the towers. Maybe there’ll be a next time and circumstances will allow Joey to come along. I don’t know if he would like the amount of driving we’re doing and the pace might be a bit slow for his tastes, but I’m sure he’d love to take in the history.

After our visit to the castle and because it had started to rain again, we went for tea at a really charming little tea shop we’d also spotted the night before. We had tea, but instead of scones, Mike had parsnip soup and I had a garlic-mint chicken salad. Something different and quite welcome. From there, we walked around some more, stopping at a gift shop or two, and making our way to the waterfront back towards all the Veteran’s Day activities. We caught the very tail end of some sort of parade and got to hear the band play a teensy bit before that was the end of all of the events. We headed back round towards the water, found a dry bench, and watched the bay for a while before going back to the room for a rest. Dinner was at a nearby pub, where almost everyone was speaking Welsh, so Mike was as pleased at the end of the day as he was at the beginning. Bedtime brought a few more squeaks from Ollie. I miss Ernie.