Judy's Honorary Blog

I asked Judy to to be an honorary author for my blog. I knew it would be kind of boring from my perspective because I have already experienced and written about everything they have done. It took some convincing but she eventually agreed. So, here is her experience from the time they left Iowa until the time we left for Scotland. I will prick up the blog from Scotland on when I have a chance. We have been having so much fun it is hard to get time to sit down and blog. Enjoy!

Amy asked that I write as a guest on her blog giving my impression of our trip to Wales and Scotland so far.  Where do I begin?  There is so much I could tell you but I’ll try to keep it to a minimum so I don’t bore you all to death.  It truly has been an adventure to say the least.   We took off out of Dubuque on a cloudy, dreary Wednesday afternoon at 2:05 p.m. and winged our way to Chicago.  Once above the clouds, we hit beautiful sunshine and could look down on puffy white marshmallow clouds. 

Since we had a bit of a layover before our flight to Wales, we decided to find something to wet our whistle, so we found a little bar and celebrated the start of our vacation with a nice cold glass of beer.  Once our flight was called we got ourselves settled in for the 8-hour ride to Manchester, England.  We were served a snack and shortly after, our dinner.  Then it was time to settle in to try to get some sleep, but how do you sleep when you’re not tired yet?  Once night settled in, it was a little easier to catch a few winks.  I could only doze off and on due to the excitement and anxiousness related to flying because I’m not really a big lover of flying, I’m sorry to say.  No sooner had I dozed off, and night quickly turned to day.  Even though my watch only said midnight our time, it was actually 5 a.m England time.  Believe me though my body was telling me it was only midnight.  We touched down at exactly 7:18 a.m. to a very misty, cloudy England day with a temp of only 50 degrees. 

Now came the fun part!  We had to discover how to get to Amy in Bangor, Wales, by taking the train system.  After some confusion and having a little difficulty understanding the thick English brogue, I finally got proper directions on how to board the train for Bangor.  The challenging part though was finding the correct platform for boarding and then having to change trains 3 times before we got there.  With the help of everyone, we soon became ole’ pros at taking the train system and finally arrived in Bangor at 12:30 p.m.  

What a beautiful, quaint, eclectic little town.  It looked like something out of a Hansel and Gretel book.   We began walking in search of The Garth Guest House, which was to be our home for 2 nights.  We walked and walked and walked.  Finally, after about 12 blocks, we found the quaint little bed and breakfast we would be staying in but alas, the proprietor of the property was nowhere to be found.  No one answered the doorbell to our dismay as we stood in the mist wondering what to do next.  Julie decided to stop next door and see if anyone was home.  Since arriving in country we found people to be very helpful in answering any questions we might have so it couldn’t hurt, could it?  An elderly gentleman came to the door and said he knew Les and Rita, our hosts well but did not know where they could be so being the friendly gentleman he was, he quickly invited us in out of the rain for a cup of tea or coffee.  We told him we did not want to impose upon his day, but he insisted we come in out of the rain.  He proved to be a very nice man and made us immediately feel welcome in his home, serving us coffee and sharing some of his life history, which was quite interesting.  

Finally, our host arrived home and we proceeded to check into our B&B.  Steve and I and Aggie were given a small room on 2^nd floor with 3 twin beds in it, while Pat was given her own room, and Pete and Julie were given theirs.  Fortunately, we picked a room that had its own bathroom.  Sorry to say, Pat, Pete, & Julie had to share a bathroom with other guests.   

We were meeting Amy at 5 p.m. in a local pub so immediately freshened up and took off walking to find the pub called Yates to join Amy for dinner.  As we approached downtown we came upon a very old church and immediately stepped back into history when we walked into an old Cathedral named St. Deiniol (St. Daniel) Cathedral.  The Cathedral was made entirely of very old stone, and we discovered it was built in the early 1200’s.  It was absolutely too beautiful to describe with old frescos depicting the life of Christ, a very old cross hanging from the ceiling, and a very old story to go along with its old edifice. It really was like traveling through a time machine back to the 13^th century.  We even heard the old pipe organ playing.   

We finally wandered on to meet Amy and her 2 good friends, Riley and Sheilagh, to have dinner, and to discover what ales, lagers, and hard ciders tasted like.  Julie, Aggie, and the boys really enjoyed an ale drink called Carling while I decided I really enjoyed the Strongbow hard cider with black current.  Yum!!!  We each had a sandwich with chips (really French fries), each trying something a little different.  Pete tried the Bangors and mash, which is really sausages and mashed potatoes with onion gravy.  I had a steak sandwich with a sweet onion relish sauce.  Believe me boys and girls, the beef is certainly not good ole Iowa corn-fed beef, so anybody growing corn-fed beef can be very proud with what you supply to the American population.  To say the least, beef was not a favorite of mine. 

We then proceeded to wonder around town hitting a few pubs here and there.  Amy took us down to the pier, which is a pier leading out over the Menai Strait, a body of water that runs through the town of Bangor.  On our way back to the B&B we stopped at a few more pubs called The Tap and Spile and the Shipyard along the way, meeting some very exceptionally friendly people along the way.  We even ran into our B&B host at one pub who promptly bought a round for all of us to celebrate our Wales adventure.  One gentleman even taught us a little Welsh, but sorry to say, I don’t remember a word of it now.  He even told us about an old Welsh town with 52 letters in it.  What fun!!  Needless to say, we all slept quite soundly that night.

The following morning we awoke to a somewhat cloudy day.  I was quite excited as Amy was going to play tour guide and take us to 2 of the exceptionally well-preserved castles in the area.  But first, we were going to experience a full English, which is a breakfast consisting of fried eggs, bacon (which to me was really ham), 2 sausages (which were more like a blah, mealy hot dogs), pork n’ beans, sautéed mushrooms, a grilled Roma tomato, toast, and OJ.  Pat and I also noticed that when you ask for coffee, it is usually not perked coffee but instant.  I am guessing since the English are tea-drinking people, real perked coffee is not a top priority. 

We proceeded onto the bus station to purchase our tickets and head out to Beaumaris Castle.  Oh my God…there really are no words to describe what a beautifully preserved castle it is.  This castle is located on Anglesey Island and was a fortress built by King Edward I for defending the coast line.  This castle was built around 1289.  We entered the castle over the moat filled with water sporting beautiful swimming pairs of swans to create a Romeo and Juliet feel about the entrance.  Pictures just had to be taken and I started snapping away in every direction trying to capture the feeling I was having about this place.  When we think of the United States having old things, we can only go back about 200 years in history, but imaging seeing something anywhere from 800 to 1000 years old!!!  I imagined myself as a knight running (even though I can’t run anymore) up the tiny, narrow stone stairs to the top fortress to defend my king, pointing my bow and arrow through tiny rectangular openings in the sides of the castle, and throwing my enemies in the dungeon.  I know it sounds far-fetched, but imaging what really happened there is astounding and imaging whose footsteps you might have stepped in was awe-inspiring.  King Arthur and Sir Lancelot lived in these ruins.  It is truly one of those things if you have a chance to experience, you must.  We crawled around the fortresses and discovered every nook and cranny possible.  What fun!!!

We were transported back to Bangor by bus and settled on eating at The Fat Cat Café for lunch.  I had a meal of a Belgian waffle with caramelized hot sauce over bananas and ice cream.  Yum is all I can say!  Steve tried a mackerel sandwich.  Holy mackerel!!!  He is an adventuresome eater though and had to try something different.  I don’t think he was too fond of it though, too fishy tasting, he said.  I noticed some of the more popular cuisines in Wales are mushy peas (smashed up peas that look like baby food), the bangers and mash, soups are all pureed, and fish and chips (French fries).

After lunch, we got back on the bus and headed over to the Caenarfon Castle.  I’m sure glad we went to see Beaumaris Castle first because this one was even more exceptional.  Again, we crawled around and to my 3 daughters, believe it or not, your old mother walked up or I should probably say crawled up, 142 very steep stone steps to get to the top of a tower that overlooked the entire castle.  That was quite a feat for me to those of you who know me.  I am not a very physically active person, so this was quite a challenge for me especially with only being able to hang onto a rope as a stair rail.  I climbed and climbed and then crawled up the last 10 to 12 steps.  I was totally exhausted once I made it to the top but it was totally worth it.  I felt like I should have shouted, “Romeo, Oh Romeo, where art thou Romeo”.  But alas, my Romeo was standing right next to me.  The view was stupendous.  This castle also was built sometime in the 13^th century and in the center of the courtyard is a large circle floor where Prince Charles was invested as the Prince of Wales, which simply means he was endowed the title of Prince by Queen Elizabeth.  This will also be the place where William will be given the title of Prince once Charles has taken over as king upon Elizabeth’s death.

Some of the interesting things I noticed about Wales is that green ivy grows everywhere…up trees, in the ditches, over fences, in sidewalk cracks, everywhere and I mean everywhere.  Chimneys are also very unique in Wales and England.  Most houses sport anywhere from 1 to 4 chimneys, sometimes even more, each sporting very different looking tops…some looked like hen and chick flower pots, others like royal crowns, some like turned over soup bowls.  Some had wire cages over the tops to keep the gulls from nesting on them.  These chimneys led to fireplaces throughout the house.  Years ago each house had a fireplace in every room, therefore for each fireplace, 1 chimney was needed. 

Speaking of gulls, they are everywhere.  Sometimes while walking around I felt like I was in a scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s movie, “The Birds”.  They are everywhere and pooping everywhere.  We had commented numerous times that we had all been extremely lucky no one had been gull pooped on.  We spoke too soon…on the ride back from the castle, Steve got gull pooped on.

For those farmers out there reading this, you make your fences all wrong.  You need to take the rocks from your fields and build your fences.  Paddocks or blocked off sections of fields are cordoned off for quite large herds of sheep to graze in.  You can see sheep everywhere you look.

Some words we found interesting were nappies, which are diapers; when someone graduates from school, they pass out; to rent is to let; to exit an area is way out; restrooms are toilets; yielding the right away is give way; an elevator is a lift; a car park is a parking lot; it is anti-clockwise and clockwise, not counter-clockwise; putting a sprint on is getting a move on; and a detour is deviated traffic.  There were others but too many to mention here.  Oh and by the way, if you think gas (petro) is expensive in the U.S. you should have to buy it here…it’s 135.9 per liter, which is approximately $9 or $10 per gallon!!!

Well, I hope I haven’t bored all of you too much, but I have so much to tell and not enough time.  We haven’t even gotten to Scotland yet but I will let Amy tell you about Scotland.  We are having an absolute blast, and I am treasuring every moment here as I am sure I will never return, so am trying to capture every moment to memory.  Everyone take care, and I’ll see you when we get back to the good ole’ USA."

Stay posted for the Scotland experience!

Until next time...

~Amy