Wales

Sylv and I recently spent a week down in Wales. We were camping, so we were particularly happy to have a week of pretty good weather! We started iwith a couple of nights in Conwy, North Wales, then headed down to Snowdonia for a couple of nights. We then spent two nights at Newport on the North Pembrokeshire coast before heading across South Wales to Ele and Steve's wedding in Gloucestershire (subject of a later post).

I'll let the photos do most of the talking.

The mighty Welsh dragon!

Caernarvon Castle

Beaumaris Castle (on the Isle of Anglesay)

I would pour boiling oil on this guy - the gate had a mechanism for doing just that!

Conwy Castle in the distance, from the (largely intact) town walls. It was great how the castle and walls were integrated with the modern town.

Allegedly the smallest house in Britain ,build up against the outside of the town wall.

A 4000-year old copper mine that you can go inside! It's amazing what was achieved digging with bones and antlers. We really enjoyed this. Sylvia enjoyed wearing the hard hats most of all.

A beautiful setting, our camp site in a field at the foot of Snowdon.

We didn't get snowed on on Snowdon, but didn't get much of a view either.

Sylvia's works' parent company is Carillion. Here they are making a mess on the summit of Snowdon. I think it's disgraceful - if you think so too, you should email Sylvia to complain.

At a hide in a nature reserve. We saw very few birds apart from swallows, ducks and a couple of tits but the walk around the salt marsh and forest was pleasant. Good way to break a long car journey.

The North Pembrokeshire coast is spectacular. We walked a day of the 10 or 12 day Pembrokeshire Coastal Path.

Sylvia just loves hard hats! Continuing our Hard Hat Tour of Wales, we went to Big Pit, a former colliery in Blaenavon. It closed in the 80's and is now the National Mining Museum of Wales. We went down the pit on a tour guided by a former miner who was a real laugh. It's not so deep (only 100 m or so underground I think) but is called Big Pit because the main shaft is so big. There are kilometres of underground workings. There are also good exhibitions and an excellent audio-visual display. It really gave a good impression of the society based on the mines, and the culture of the miners that still exists today.