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Entry tags:
Travelogue
Spent Saturday and Sunday at a living history show in Cape May, NJ. Drove home Sunday night.
Spent Monday unpacking, doing laundry, paying bills, and re-packing. Took a cab to JFK for an 8 PM flight to London, which was delayed to 8:30, then 9:00. Another passenger mentioned that there was a transit strike scheduled for the London area. Fortunately, the coach we were to take was from an independent company, unaffected by the strike except for being busier than usual; I made a reservation for the 12:30 coach the next day Meanwhile, the flight was further delayed to 9:30, then 10:00. At 9:45, our plane was actually at the gate, scheduled to leave at 10:45. We boarded around 10:30 and left the gate at 11:45.
Landed at Heathrow around 11:45 AM Tuesday. Missed the 12:30 coach, but managed to get seats on the 1:30 coach to Cardiff. Walked a few blocks to B&B, checked in, got doner & chips for dinner, and collapsed.
Mid-day Wednesday we picked up a rental car and drove the few miles to Caerphilly, where where we had lunch, toured the castle,
and D twisted her ankle. Which puts a crimp in walking plans for the rest of the trip…
Returned to hotel, got take-out Thai, bought a bag of ice, and she iced her foot in a mop-bucket. In the course of the day, we noticed a poster about an open-air theatre festival, whose first show was “Blackadder Goes Forth”, opening Thursday night.
Thursday morning we drove a bit farther, to Tintern Abbey
and Chepstow Castle. The latter is originally Norman, having been started in 1067.
200 years later William the Marshal acquired it along with his wife, Pembrokeshire, and Leinster; he expanded it using the latest techniques from France, such as round towers and
the oldest surviving wooden doors in Wales, tree-ring-dated to 1297, the year William and Isabel were married. William’s grandson expanded the castle again, with luxury apartments. Etc.
We’ve had a difficult time getting net access other than wi-fi through the B&B. On landing in England, we each got a text message from Verizon offering us a $10/day roaming plan, which we accepted. But it didn’t actually work. I spent a fair amount of Wednesday and Thursday trying to talk to somebody at Verizon and find out what was wrong. Eventually I learned that there was also a $100/month roaming plan, so we both switched to that, and it worked… for my phone, not for D’s. But I was able to reserve two seats for the theatre, which conveniently was a few blocks’ walk from our B&B. As we sat down, I finally managed to get through to a tech support person at Verizon, who had some useful suggestions.
We’re mostly navigating using the car’s built-in voice navigation system, which is not as good as Google Maps (although I’m biased). It always describes roads by their highway number, e.g. “A4519”, even if all the signs refer to it by a street name instead. It told us to “turn right to stay on the A-465”, when the street signs said clearly that the A-465 went straight ahead (and we discovered later that we should have turned right to take the A-470 instead). It told us to turn right at an intersection where we actually needed to go straight across, which was very slightly to the right. It told us to turn left on a street that was a pedestrian zone. And so on.
Friday morning we checked out of the B&B in Cardiff and drove north. I had planned to do a 4-mile mountain hike, but with D’s ankle dubious, we tried a less strenuous “four waterfalls” walk. (Click photo to enlarge.)
At least, the first mile was level and non-strenuous; then it got steep. We got to the first of the four waterfalls, the Sgŵd Clun-Gwyn, then walked back to the car and drove to the next B&B outside Merthyr Tudful.
Saturday we visited two more scenic waterfalls (click photos to enlarge).
Currently recuperating in room.
Spent Monday unpacking, doing laundry, paying bills, and re-packing. Took a cab to JFK for an 8 PM flight to London, which was delayed to 8:30, then 9:00. Another passenger mentioned that there was a transit strike scheduled for the London area. Fortunately, the coach we were to take was from an independent company, unaffected by the strike except for being busier than usual; I made a reservation for the 12:30 coach the next day Meanwhile, the flight was further delayed to 9:30, then 10:00. At 9:45, our plane was actually at the gate, scheduled to leave at 10:45. We boarded around 10:30 and left the gate at 11:45.
Landed at Heathrow around 11:45 AM Tuesday. Missed the 12:30 coach, but managed to get seats on the 1:30 coach to Cardiff. Walked a few blocks to B&B, checked in, got doner & chips for dinner, and collapsed.
Mid-day Wednesday we picked up a rental car and drove the few miles to Caerphilly, where where we had lunch, toured the castle,
and D twisted her ankle. Which puts a crimp in walking plans for the rest of the trip…
Returned to hotel, got take-out Thai, bought a bag of ice, and she iced her foot in a mop-bucket. In the course of the day, we noticed a poster about an open-air theatre festival, whose first show was “Blackadder Goes Forth”, opening Thursday night.
Thursday morning we drove a bit farther, to Tintern Abbey
and Chepstow Castle. The latter is originally Norman, having been started in 1067.
200 years later William the Marshal acquired it along with his wife, Pembrokeshire, and Leinster; he expanded it using the latest techniques from France, such as round towers and
the oldest surviving wooden doors in Wales, tree-ring-dated to 1297, the year William and Isabel were married. William’s grandson expanded the castle again, with luxury apartments. Etc.
We’ve had a difficult time getting net access other than wi-fi through the B&B. On landing in England, we each got a text message from Verizon offering us a $10/day roaming plan, which we accepted. But it didn’t actually work. I spent a fair amount of Wednesday and Thursday trying to talk to somebody at Verizon and find out what was wrong. Eventually I learned that there was also a $100/month roaming plan, so we both switched to that, and it worked… for my phone, not for D’s. But I was able to reserve two seats for the theatre, which conveniently was a few blocks’ walk from our B&B. As we sat down, I finally managed to get through to a tech support person at Verizon, who had some useful suggestions.
We’re mostly navigating using the car’s built-in voice navigation system, which is not as good as Google Maps (although I’m biased). It always describes roads by their highway number, e.g. “A4519”, even if all the signs refer to it by a street name instead. It told us to “turn right to stay on the A-465”, when the street signs said clearly that the A-465 went straight ahead (and we discovered later that we should have turned right to take the A-470 instead). It told us to turn right at an intersection where we actually needed to go straight across, which was very slightly to the right. It told us to turn left on a street that was a pedestrian zone. And so on.
Friday morning we checked out of the B&B in Cardiff and drove north. I had planned to do a 4-mile mountain hike, but with D’s ankle dubious, we tried a less strenuous “four waterfalls” walk. (Click photo to enlarge.)
At least, the first mile was level and non-strenuous; then it got steep. We got to the first of the four waterfalls, the Sgŵd Clun-Gwyn, then walked back to the car and drove to the next B&B outside Merthyr Tudful.
Saturday we visited two more scenic waterfalls (click photos to enlarge).
Currently recuperating in room.