First Field Trip

Yesterday was a very boring day so I didn't want to bore you guys with a boring blog. It was a really really windy rainy day, but according to my flat mates it was worse that it normally is. So that is promising! Overall, the weather has been pretty good and everything is really green and beautiful!

Today was our first field trip with the program. It wasn't as cool as it should have been because of all the rain but it was still pretty cool! Tecwyn informed us that they have had record rain fall around here in the last few days and it was very obvious as our day progressed. Often, as we passed through the valleys, the rivers were well over their limits. We were also informed that when that happens a lot of sheep will drown because there are so many and the farmers cannot get them all to higher ground fast enough, how unfortunate! But there are about 11 million sheep in Wales and just over 2 million people so there are plenty to go around I guess.

So, our first stop was Llandudno (pronounced clan-did-no). This is a beautiful coastal town that had a beautiful pier we walked on. (Lots of pictures from this on my facebook page if you want to check them out!) There was also a lot of shops and nice hotels that lined the sea. Great tourist place! After leaving Llandudno, we drove down the Giant Orme (kind of sounds like arm but means worm, because from the air it looks like a worm coming out of the water). This was a crazy narrow path carved out of the rocks that had 1-way traffic, thank goodness! Cool fact: toward the end of this path/road is the house that belonged to the family of the real Alice from Alice in wonderland. Lewis Carroll was said to have written the great novel in this very area and is one of Llandudno's claims to fame!

After another 45 minute trek through the windy roads of northern Wales we ended in a small town called Betws-y-coed (Pronounced something like Betsy-coid). We had lunch in this cute little town and it was kind of funny because most of us packed lunches but there was no where to eat and it was raining out so we ended up eating in this cute little ice cream shop. We got ice cream because we felt bad eating our own food in there and the ice cream ended up being excellent! Betws-y-coed is known to get over 200 inches of rain a year and Llandudno which is just 20 miles or so away is known to be the driest place in northern Wales... crazy!

After leaving Betws-y-coed we came to Swallow falls which was so cool! Again lots of pictures on my facebook page, but this was a huge waterfall! It was actually kind of scary how powerful the water was! It was really funny because to "get in" we had to pay a pound and go through this tiny spinning gate thing that we squeezed 2 people at a time through. Pretty comical!

Next, it was on to Snowdonia! What a cool place! We passed by Llyn Ogwen (Llyn means lake) which is the lake that King Arthur was said to have thrown Excalibur into and a mysterious hand caught it! Snowdonia National Park was established in 1951 and is made up of the beautiful mountains that we walked through. Our walk through the valley led us to Llyn Idwal. This lake is said to have a monster at the bottom and birds refuse to fly over it... pretty creepy! And where the lake is located is called the devil's kitchen because when the wind blows it sounds like people are being tortured.... also very creepy!

It was a fabulous day of exploring Wales, and we are going to a castle for sure tomorrow! How exciting! We ended the day today with a few of us girls cooking a lovely meal together which was also super fun!

Until tomorrow....

~Amy