An Awfully Big Adventure: UK Travel Adventure 2011, Part 4
Well, we're at the halfway point of my series of posts chronicling my summer adventures in the UK! This is the last post that takes place in Wales; after this we go to two Scottish cities- one which I liked and one, well, not so much- and then back to London. With the nearly five-month time gap between when this stuff happened and when I'm actually writing about it, it's a good thing I kept such exhaustive notes on each leg of the trip!
I know I always encourage you guys to look at the public facebook albums I've made for each location I post about, but I would especially direct you to the album for today's entry, since I'm particularly proud of the photos that I took in Conwy. "Picturesque" doesn't even begin to describe what this place is like.
Part 1: London, England
Part 2: Cardiff, Wales
Part 3: Hay-on-Wye, Wales
Bright and early on the morning of June 24, Gen and I caught the bus from Hay to Hereford, and then the train straight through to Conwy. By now, our suitcases and backpacks were getting kind of heavy, which correlated nicely with the terrain getting progressively hillier. Our hostel in Conwy was at the top of a very steep incline just outside of town, and dragging the rolling suitcase up the hill after a long bus ride, I wasn't sure I was going to make it! On the plus side, as I pointed out to Gen, I was now more in shape than I had been in a long time. I've always been very thin, and lots of people confuse this with being "in shape"- but, as any dancer can tell you, they are not the same thing. How much you weigh and how much you can do without tiring or pushing your body too far are often quite different. Before this trip, I was on my feet a lot due to my job, but wasn't getting any strenuous physical activity apart from that. By the end of the approximately three weeks I spent running around the British countryside, my legs were strong from walking up all those hills (and steps of castles), and my arms and shoulders were all bulked up from lifting heavy luggage and dragging it around. Even though I was well on my way to physical fitness by the time we got to Conwy, though, I was still nearly defeated by that hill!
The hostel was nice, but as we went along, the accommodations in which we stayed got progressively larger. I'm not talking about the individual rooms so much as the buildings themselves. The bigger the hostel, the less comfortable overall I felt. While there was only one time (in Edinburgh) where I had to share a room with more than 3 other people, I realize now that it wasn't the number of people in the room that bothered me, but the fact that a bigger establishment felt less personal. The London hostel, for example, had really nice staff that gave us recommendations and really helped us get settled, even though the hostel itself was kind of spartan in the way it was run. The staff at the other hostels, this one included, were friendly, but it's hard to be that involved when you have hundreds of other guests.
We also had another installment in the Saga of Interesting Showers. It should be noted that I shower at night, and Gen showers in the morning, which means that I always sort of got the "test run" of the shower when we arrived. In Conwy, the water pressure in the en-suite shower was scarily strong. I told Gen when I got out that I felt like I'd been hosed down in an industrial-strength chamber. But at least the water was warm and, well, you certainly felt clean afterward.
I think we had one of our strangest roommates here at this hostel. It was an older woman (I'd guess in her early seventies, although I'm not a good judge of age so she could have been slightly younger) whose name I never learned. In fact, I learned very little about her, because she never really talked to us much. She had a strange habit of muttering to herself, not in a crazy way, just in the way that a lot of older people have. Every once in a while, she would spontaneously break off from puttering around the room and engage us in extremely random small talk. I never quite got the hang of her.
We were so tired on the 24th when we got to the hostel that we didn't do much. I think I probably napped- I know I sat in bed and wrote part of an early draft of the story I've been working on since I got back- and then we got some fish and chips for dinner. Here is a picture of Conwy, for reference; I think this was actually taken the day after we arrived, though.
The next day, on the 25th, we packed in a LOT of history and scenic walking. Conwy is right on the water, and the first place we went was a little waterfront area which happened to have a craft fair going on at the time. Mostly, though, we just walked and admired the incredibly beautiful views.
Then we made our way toward the castle itself. On the way, we passed through the yard of an old church. Gen was very enthusiastic and immediately started having a look around- she loves old buildings like this, I have to admit, it was a striking building.
At this point in the travel diaries, it becomes hard to talk at length about the castles we saw. I mean, aside from the exhibits within them, the castles served most of the same purposes, and we just browsed around rather than taking a tour or reading a brochure, so if there were significant differences, we didn't make ourselves aware of them. The thing that stood out about Conwy Castle for me was the astonishing height of it. We were able to go up to the very top of the towers, and while I'm already a fan of the view from high up, the views of Wales from those towers was magnificent. I couldn't stop taking pictures. The ones below are just a few.
The castle from the very bottom, taken so you could see the way the different areas were sectioned off.
From about a middle height.
ALL the way up. How can you not love that view? (My dad, who is afraid of heights- a trait I have clearly not inherited- would be terrified to go up this high.)
After spending several hours exploring probably every crevice of that castle, we came back down to a reasonable altitude and walked a few minutes downtown to an old house, called Plas Mawr. It was from the 1500s, I think (maybe the 1400s? I didn't write this down) and it was very interesting to look at. One of my favorite parts was this old kitchen.
It was late afternoon when we finished with that. We were about to head off for dinner when we passed another old house on the road. This one claimed to be the oldest house in the whole town of Conwy- built in the 1300s. I was with an archaeologist and history buff, so we had no choice but to veer in and check it out before it closed for the day. The person running the admissions was an older man who seemed so delighted that we were there that we couldn't help but come in. I assumed through his reaction that the house didn't get that many visitors, especially not young American tourists like us, so his pleased shock at seeing us was pretty genuine. We browsed around that house for a while too, but it wasn't very big and we were getting hungry, so we got some food and came back to the hostel.
We were leaving for Glasgow (which was actually, despite all of this, the main destination of our trip) on the 26th, but Gen wanted to go to church first, so we went to mass at a little Catholic church we'd passed on the edge of town on our way to and from the hostel. It was a cute little place with a beautiful garden out front, and when we got there, the service turned out to be very nice. It also turned out to be partially in Welsh. I don't know if you've ever seen anything written in Welsh, much less heard it spoken, but it isn't the sort of language you can sound out through intuition. Gen actually tried to follow along on the Welsh parts; I just stood there quietly and waited until they were saying something I could understand. After the service we had just enough time to run back to the hostel, where they were holding our bags for us, and head for the train station to catch the train that would take us to Scotland.
Oh, I also forgot one thing: as if we hadn't had enough of high-altitude views, Gen and I walked along the footpath on the wall surrounding the town on the 25th. There were some smaller towers there too, and you bet we climbed up them. Here are some pictures I took from the top:
Gen. In the background, Wales.
I know I always encourage you guys to look at the public facebook albums I've made for each location I post about, but I would especially direct you to the album for today's entry, since I'm particularly proud of the photos that I took in Conwy. "Picturesque" doesn't even begin to describe what this place is like.
Part 1: London, England
Part 2: Cardiff, Wales
Part 3: Hay-on-Wye, Wales
Bright and early on the morning of June 24, Gen and I caught the bus from Hay to Hereford, and then the train straight through to Conwy. By now, our suitcases and backpacks were getting kind of heavy, which correlated nicely with the terrain getting progressively hillier. Our hostel in Conwy was at the top of a very steep incline just outside of town, and dragging the rolling suitcase up the hill after a long bus ride, I wasn't sure I was going to make it! On the plus side, as I pointed out to Gen, I was now more in shape than I had been in a long time. I've always been very thin, and lots of people confuse this with being "in shape"- but, as any dancer can tell you, they are not the same thing. How much you weigh and how much you can do without tiring or pushing your body too far are often quite different. Before this trip, I was on my feet a lot due to my job, but wasn't getting any strenuous physical activity apart from that. By the end of the approximately three weeks I spent running around the British countryside, my legs were strong from walking up all those hills (and steps of castles), and my arms and shoulders were all bulked up from lifting heavy luggage and dragging it around. Even though I was well on my way to physical fitness by the time we got to Conwy, though, I was still nearly defeated by that hill!
The hostel was nice, but as we went along, the accommodations in which we stayed got progressively larger. I'm not talking about the individual rooms so much as the buildings themselves. The bigger the hostel, the less comfortable overall I felt. While there was only one time (in Edinburgh) where I had to share a room with more than 3 other people, I realize now that it wasn't the number of people in the room that bothered me, but the fact that a bigger establishment felt less personal. The London hostel, for example, had really nice staff that gave us recommendations and really helped us get settled, even though the hostel itself was kind of spartan in the way it was run. The staff at the other hostels, this one included, were friendly, but it's hard to be that involved when you have hundreds of other guests.
We also had another installment in the Saga of Interesting Showers. It should be noted that I shower at night, and Gen showers in the morning, which means that I always sort of got the "test run" of the shower when we arrived. In Conwy, the water pressure in the en-suite shower was scarily strong. I told Gen when I got out that I felt like I'd been hosed down in an industrial-strength chamber. But at least the water was warm and, well, you certainly felt clean afterward.
I think we had one of our strangest roommates here at this hostel. It was an older woman (I'd guess in her early seventies, although I'm not a good judge of age so she could have been slightly younger) whose name I never learned. In fact, I learned very little about her, because she never really talked to us much. She had a strange habit of muttering to herself, not in a crazy way, just in the way that a lot of older people have. Every once in a while, she would spontaneously break off from puttering around the room and engage us in extremely random small talk. I never quite got the hang of her.
We were so tired on the 24th when we got to the hostel that we didn't do much. I think I probably napped- I know I sat in bed and wrote part of an early draft of the story I've been working on since I got back- and then we got some fish and chips for dinner. Here is a picture of Conwy, for reference; I think this was actually taken the day after we arrived, though.
The next day, on the 25th, we packed in a LOT of history and scenic walking. Conwy is right on the water, and the first place we went was a little waterfront area which happened to have a craft fair going on at the time. Mostly, though, we just walked and admired the incredibly beautiful views.
Then we made our way toward the castle itself. On the way, we passed through the yard of an old church. Gen was very enthusiastic and immediately started having a look around- she loves old buildings like this, I have to admit, it was a striking building.
At this point in the travel diaries, it becomes hard to talk at length about the castles we saw. I mean, aside from the exhibits within them, the castles served most of the same purposes, and we just browsed around rather than taking a tour or reading a brochure, so if there were significant differences, we didn't make ourselves aware of them. The thing that stood out about Conwy Castle for me was the astonishing height of it. We were able to go up to the very top of the towers, and while I'm already a fan of the view from high up, the views of Wales from those towers was magnificent. I couldn't stop taking pictures. The ones below are just a few.
The castle from the very bottom, taken so you could see the way the different areas were sectioned off.
From about a middle height.
ALL the way up. How can you not love that view? (My dad, who is afraid of heights- a trait I have clearly not inherited- would be terrified to go up this high.)
After spending several hours exploring probably every crevice of that castle, we came back down to a reasonable altitude and walked a few minutes downtown to an old house, called Plas Mawr. It was from the 1500s, I think (maybe the 1400s? I didn't write this down) and it was very interesting to look at. One of my favorite parts was this old kitchen.
It was late afternoon when we finished with that. We were about to head off for dinner when we passed another old house on the road. This one claimed to be the oldest house in the whole town of Conwy- built in the 1300s. I was with an archaeologist and history buff, so we had no choice but to veer in and check it out before it closed for the day. The person running the admissions was an older man who seemed so delighted that we were there that we couldn't help but come in. I assumed through his reaction that the house didn't get that many visitors, especially not young American tourists like us, so his pleased shock at seeing us was pretty genuine. We browsed around that house for a while too, but it wasn't very big and we were getting hungry, so we got some food and came back to the hostel.
We were leaving for Glasgow (which was actually, despite all of this, the main destination of our trip) on the 26th, but Gen wanted to go to church first, so we went to mass at a little Catholic church we'd passed on the edge of town on our way to and from the hostel. It was a cute little place with a beautiful garden out front, and when we got there, the service turned out to be very nice. It also turned out to be partially in Welsh. I don't know if you've ever seen anything written in Welsh, much less heard it spoken, but it isn't the sort of language you can sound out through intuition. Gen actually tried to follow along on the Welsh parts; I just stood there quietly and waited until they were saying something I could understand. After the service we had just enough time to run back to the hostel, where they were holding our bags for us, and head for the train station to catch the train that would take us to Scotland.
Oh, I also forgot one thing: as if we hadn't had enough of high-altitude views, Gen and I walked along the footpath on the wall surrounding the town on the 25th. There were some smaller towers there too, and you bet we climbed up them. Here are some pictures I took from the top:
Gen. In the background, Wales.