Well, I’m back from my whirlwind trip to Wales! On Friday morning I set off to Manchester and Jasmin met me at the station for the beginning of our shopping odyssey. To kick things off, we had Boost at the station!!! Five hours later, I had 2 pairs of pyjamas, a new yellow coat, an aqua beret, a new scarf and a new wallet! We had a lot of fun exploring the shops, and grabbed dinner before meeting Owen.
We hopped on the first train to Crewe, then on another to Llandudno. We passed the time playing Monopoly Deal (it’s a lot of fun!). Owen’s Dad picked us up from the station and took us back to his house in Deganwy, where we dumped our stuff before going out again to see Harry Potter 7. The movie was quite good, although a lot of the scenes were different to how I imagined them in the novel. They sell sweet popcorn at the cinemas, so I tried a bit of that and had Baskin Robbins ice cream too!
Anyway, we took a quick drive to the near side of the river after the movie (around 1AM) to just get a sense of the quiet and beauty of the landscape, before going back and straight to sleep.
In the morning, Jasmin and I left at around 10, and Sel (Owen’s Dad) dropped us off half way to Conwy Castle. On Friday night Jasmin and Yvonne (Owen’s Mum) laughed at me because I was ridiculously excited to see a real castle! It was even better during the day up close!
We spent about an hour wandering around the castle, through the great hall and then up four of the six towers. The views were spectacular! From there, we walked past the smallest house in Great Britain along the riverfront, and then up along the castle walls. It was amazing – people have their gardens in the little alcoves of the wall. I can’t imagine growing up alongside a castle!
From there, Owen picked us up, and we drove for quite a while, picked up sandwiches from Ham Bone, and grabbed cakes from a local bakery (yum!). I wasn’t feeling too well (this cold just won’t go away), but I was fine once we got up the top of the mountain in the fresh air. Owen took us on a local’s tour, tramping through the scrub (or whatever the Welsh equivalent is) and the mud down to the most still, perfect lake I’ve ever seen. It was actually like a mirror, reflecting the cloudy sky.
Despite the mud and prickly bushes, the view and serenity was worth it. I even saw a wild holly bush! We then went for a drive over to the Orme, which is a large body of land sticking out into the ocean. The day was foggy, so looking off the edge was like looking out over the end of the world. It was very cold, but we saw it as the sun was setting, so it was quite beautiful.
To finish off such an amazing day, Yvonne made a delicious lasagne, and we had proper UK chips with it, which were amazing!!! I’m so glad I had the chance to see this little piece of Wales, and now I’ll definitely try to get back there one day to see some more.
I got back to Leeds last night, and spent today at the Royal Armouries with Christina (Will’s housemate from Ireland) and Junko, her Japanese friends. It was awesome to see such a huge collection of weaponry from the UK and around the world, including the world’s only almost-complete suit of elephant armour.We had a lot of fun wandering around all afternoon.
So that’s the news from here! I’m planning to go to the Christmas Market with Jasmin on Tuesday, and tomorrow Luke is taking me to the ruins of an abbey which are apparently quite beautiful. Then off to France on Thursday! Exciting!
