Wales – well it was a while ago nearly
three weeks ago now but time has been flying by and it seems that time to sit
and write is always difficult to find.
After attending the Beatherder festival it
was time to continue on with our tour of Britain before we departed for France
and eventually Boom festival. Of all the areas we visited in Britain, it is
without a doubt that I can say the friendliest people I have met on our trip so
far are from Wales. Whether cracking jokes in the local shop, or people coming
up to us on a country road where we parked for the night to make sure we were
ok, I felt completely safe and welcomed in this lovely little country.
Wales is not the biggest country but it
alongside Scotland is home to some of the most beautiful scenery in
Britain. We started our Journey into
wales by entering from the north and heading down south into Snowdonia, which
is a beautiful mountain range scattered with pristine waterways and equally
beautiful towns. I almost felt it was like each city was a finalist in the tiny
towns competition we often see in Australia.
We spent our first night wild camping just
outside of Betws-y-coed. Yes that’s really the name. Before we went further south
into Snowdonia, we decided to double back and head north to visit Conwy which
is a town situated on the north coast and features historic buildings such as
the Conwy castle and the well preserved Elizabethan house shown in the photos
below.
From Conwy we proceeded west through Wales
along the north coast, stopping for a short while in Caernarfon which is a
lovely port side city before continuing through to a town called Beddgelert,
which is near Snowdon; the highest peak in Wales reaching 3559ft above sea
level.
The next night we struggled to find a place
to wild camp after leaving the Snowdonia ranges. We ended up pulling up on the side
of a road near Mackynlleth. While we though it was a layby on the side of the
road, it turned out to be the private property of one of the nearby farmers.
After finishing dinner a four wheel drive pulled up and an older man named
David Owen walked up to our van and started asking if we were ok and what our
plans for the night entailed. We talked about how we had just eaten and would
perhaps stay put. I enquired if we were on his land and found out that we were
on a wood holding area but that he could care less if we stayed there and was
more concerned that we were camping on our own and if we were well provisioned
and felt safe. He said he felt that if we were his children he would feel
comforted knowing someone had enquired as to their safety! After a short
conversation we proceeded to his property to collect water, which we were low
on, and also heard a wonderful history of the area including the history of his
families ownership of the farms which dated as far back as the early 1700s. As
we were leaving he again hailed us to stop and insisted that we take a bottle
of wine with us to enjoy as we watched out the evening. It never ceases to amaze me the hospitality
and kindness that you can experience from people on your travels. It was
simultaneously humbling and inspiring.
Following our stay near Mackynlleth Bob and
I visited CAT (Centre for Alternative Technology), which was located just down
the road. We had intentionally stayed nearby in order to visit this centre.
Started in the 1970s by a group of people with a common intention to create a
way of living that was harmonious with the environment and had a minimal
impact, it is now a thriving centre for teaching, innovation and
environmentally sound practices. The
centre welcomes people to come for a short course, to visit its property and
see demonstrations and informative displays for a day or to come for an
extended stay, participating in daily life on the farm/ centre to gain an
in-depth understanding of environmental practices that can be applied to all
aspects of your life. There are even
Bachelor and Masters degrees available from the centre as well as their short
course program.
The location for the centre was once an old
rock quarry but has now been transformed and features gardens which supply all
the produce to feed the workers and the public visitors as well as supply all
the water and electricity needs to keep the property running, including the
technology centre and lecture arena, which hosts recognised qualifications in
many areas of sustainable practice.
After visiting CAT, we again continued
south towards the Brecon Beacons. In the town of Brecon we visited a lovely
market where we purchased, black pudding, lava bread and trout pate, which are
apparently quite typical to Wales. It is also where I finally brought a Pork
Pie. Lets just say interesting.
For those that are unfamiliar with Lava
bread, its not bread, its actually a pureed seaweed type of paste which is made
from a species of seaweed called Lava. Which I believe stands for delicious. The link below will take you to a webpage all about it...
Feeling tired from our travels we spent two
nights next to the Talybont reservoir.
This area is one of the most beautiful in Wales and the river we camped
next to had a lovely walk which took you along a series of waterfalls and
swimming pools which was extremely popular with locals. This was my ideal way
to hike. Walk ten minutes, go for a swim
and then repeat J
Our last stop in Wales was Cardiff. Bob and
I decided that tonight we would hit the town and see what Welsh people got up
to. Both being fans of Human Traffic (the movie not illegal immigration) we
also tried to find the club and street locations used in the film. Unfortunately
the club (Club X – and no its not a sex shop as we would assume in Australia)
that was used in the film as the movie clubs interior was closed. We did
however enjoy finding various spots around the city that were featured such as
the Philharmonic orchestra building and the Weatherspoons pub for the scene
where they all sing the altered version of the national anthem.
Cardiff is quite an interesting spot. Its
quite a big city although it felt very small as if it was a little town playing
at being a big city, a bit like Bendigo or Ballarat but with a huge nightlife.
We both really liked it, and not necessarily because it had an historical
beauty or was filled with interesting art, (it was in fact quite grimy along
the pub/ club strip) but because it had a very fun feel to it, and by the end
of the night we were in stitches! This is mainly because the first thing we
noticed when we arrived into the centre of the city was the number of hens
groups. As we looked around more we noticed there was also a number of bucks groups.
By the end of the night we had counted 53 different groups!! Yes that’s right
53! The best part of it was that most wore costumes with various themes not all
related to penises and sex, there was even a group of men sporting various
superhero costumes getting drunk at the local Australia bar – Walkabout.
Two levels of sports screens, a ‘surf’ bar
and a dance floor pumping out beyonce. Absolutely screamed Australia…I did
however finally get a decent beer in Britain, happily finding a Fat Yak, for
the extortionist price of 6 pound which converts to roughly 11 Australian
dollars. I know I got ripped, but after two months of luke warm and almost flat
beers I was willing to pay the price.
By the end of the night we decided we were
up for finding a club to have a bit of dance. After wandering around for a bit
we eventually came across the Oceania club. Three levels with three rooms of
various styles. The first was the ‘Chill-out bar’ but infact had the best music
playing in the club, churning out good Piano house. The third floor played
almost good electro and pop remixes, and finally the second floor by far the
funniest/ scariest, featured a lighted disco dance floor complete with
accompanying disco ball almost as if it had been taken from Saturday night
fever. The tunes were a mixture of current cheesy pop and disco classics and at
any moment I expected to see John Travolta strutting across the floor to lead a
choreographed disco dance.
Yes the last is one of the aforementioned
bucks wearing a tutu.
Having sneakily parked up in the city, the
next morning we attempted to get up and away early. Surprisingly we managed to
do this by 9am and having read about a local market that is well worth finding
we set off in the van to hunt down a good recovery breakfast. The market we
came across was only little perhaps less than 30m in length but each stall
boasted beautiful organic produce, artisan breads and pastries and even more
delicious offerings. We also managed to
have the best coffee so far in Britain. For some reason Britain also doesn’t do
coffee well. I know I am probably expecting too much coming from Melbourne, but
a Flat white is a good test of a barista as there is nowhere to hind the obvious
taste of over an compacted and bitter double shot coffee or burnt milk. Finding a coffee caravan that had flat white
on the menu was already enough to get me excited as this so far had been a
rarity. When I placed my order
tentatively, the operators turned out to have travelled for over three years in
NZ and AUS and had trained in NZ, while their boss had trained in Melbourne.
They presented the coffee to me having joked that the pressure was on as I was
from Melbourne and I was not disappointed.
Wales was a wonderful place to travel. Both
Welcoming, safe and intriguing it featured everything. We have placed Wales on the list of places we
must return to. I hope you feel a little
inspired to give this beautiful country a visit too.
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