Sunday's castle was a cave
The Welsh National Showcaves were about an hour and half's drive from where I'm staying, so I thought it might be a good place to go when the weather was a bit clearer and the views were nice. Which it was, but I was high in the Brecon Beacons for much less time than I expected, so I don't actually have any nice views... So its more caves, I'm afraid! 
I think the lads might have something to say about this next one...
...and does anyone else see a sleeping dragon here?
There were three separate caves to see, and they were all self-guided, which on the one hand was nice and free, but on the other hand made them seem much less special. You didn't get any of the stories about the different formations that guides might tell you, and there were very few labels with names. On the one hand you got to make them up yourself - but on the other hand you could only do this if you spotted them. It also made me think they'd done it to get more people through more cheaply, so the focus doesn't feel like its on how special the caves are, more "look what we've got here, we can make money from this..."
Not that it's badly done or anything - and they have their own bubbling spring (near the Iron Age farmers tableaux).
There were more dinosaurs than I expected, mind, because it was also a dinosaur park. Again, nicely done but it felt like far more effort had been put into giant plastic dinosaurs than into amazing natural caves...
Here's Bone Cave, where they found 42 human skeletons. Now, call me silly, but I think this could have been an excellent focus for the story of the area...
The third cave was Cathedral Cave - and it was beautifully big, with two waterfalls, which you walked between to get to the end of it all, and lots of water everywhere.
After all that I decided to head for a Tudor house, and find out some later Welsh history - only to be told when I'd got there that it was so "rammed" inside that they were giving people the option to turn around and maybe come back later... So I did, and headed for the Welsh National Botanical Gardens instead, since I've barely used my Royal Horticultural Society membership that I was given last year. And I still haven't, because my free entry to this garden ended in March... *headdesk* So I went in feeling a bit grumpy in the end (it's not cheap!), but then I found the pilipala house, and cheered up a bit. *g*
Not much doing in the gardens themselves, in March, but in the biodome I found Australia, and that was some nice nostalgia too. *g*
There were at least some daffodils around. *g*
And that was me - it was time to head back to the Castle for one last night...
I think the lads might have something to say about this next one...
...and does anyone else see a sleeping dragon here?
There were three separate caves to see, and they were all self-guided, which on the one hand was nice and free, but on the other hand made them seem much less special. You didn't get any of the stories about the different formations that guides might tell you, and there were very few labels with names. On the one hand you got to make them up yourself - but on the other hand you could only do this if you spotted them. It also made me think they'd done it to get more people through more cheaply, so the focus doesn't feel like its on how special the caves are, more "look what we've got here, we can make money from this..."
Not that it's badly done or anything - and they have their own bubbling spring (near the Iron Age farmers tableaux).
There were more dinosaurs than I expected, mind, because it was also a dinosaur park. Again, nicely done but it felt like far more effort had been put into giant plastic dinosaurs than into amazing natural caves...
Here's Bone Cave, where they found 42 human skeletons. Now, call me silly, but I think this could have been an excellent focus for the story of the area...
The third cave was Cathedral Cave - and it was beautifully big, with two waterfalls, which you walked between to get to the end of it all, and lots of water everywhere.
After all that I decided to head for a Tudor house, and find out some later Welsh history - only to be told when I'd got there that it was so "rammed" inside that they were giving people the option to turn around and maybe come back later... So I did, and headed for the Welsh National Botanical Gardens instead, since I've barely used my Royal Horticultural Society membership that I was given last year. And I still haven't, because my free entry to this garden ended in March... *headdesk* So I went in feeling a bit grumpy in the end (it's not cheap!), but then I found the pilipala house, and cheered up a bit. *g*
Not much doing in the gardens themselves, in March, but in the biodome I found Australia, and that was some nice nostalgia too. *g*
There were at least some daffodils around. *g*
And that was me - it was time to head back to the Castle for one last night...