Now that I’m a bit more rested since coming back late Sunday night from Cymru having travelling up by train on Friday night to visit 貝貝 in Bangor, Gwynedd; I may as well waffle on a bit about what I managed to see whilst there for the 2 days as I patiently wait for the photographs I took to upload.
Friday night was just a visit to the Bangor New Pier to admire the view with a nearly clear sky as dusk drew in for those whom where brave enough to face the now quite chilly, autumnal weather by the coast. Once back at the house then getting washed and fed, it was pretty much time to hit the sack since Saturday was to be an early day, waking at 8 a.m. and leaving the house at 9 a.m. so that we could fit our visit to Conwy and Llandudno.
The first stop on Saturday morning was Gastell Conwy which was near impossible to miss as the little trainstop has the castle looming large right next to the station. Conwy town is one of Europe’s finest examples of a Mediæval walled town and indeed the only one which is completely intact and is also judged the finest in Britain. Gastell Conwy itself, built between 1283 and 1289 by King Edward I of England is listed by UNESCO as a “World Heritage Site”.
Next was a short bus ride to Llandudno for two things, firstly for it’s connection to “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” and secondly for the Bronze Age Great Orme Mines. The Alice connection come about as Alice Liddell is believed to have come with her family on holiday to the seaside resort of Llandudno on occasion accompanied by Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, better known via his pen name of Lewis Carroll.
The real Alice was the inspiration for the heroine in this book, which may have never been written down had it not for been Alice’s persistance that Mr. Dodgson should and on the 26th of Novermber, 1862; Dodgson presented Alice a hand written and illustrated version. It wasn’t until 1865 that and extended version of the story was professionally published under Dodgson’s pen name of Lewis Carroll with illustrations by John Tenniel. Project Gutenberg has both “Alice’s Adventure in Wonderland” and it’s sequel, “Through the Looking-Glass” as freely downloadable electronic documents for non-commercial use.
Then on and upwards to the Great Orme Mines. The mine complex was originally thought to be Roman but it’s pre-historic past was finally unveiled in 1987 when waste rock from the 18th and 19th century were removed uncovering an open cast mine which is 4 000 years old and tunnel complexes, most of which still unexplored and date back to some 3 500 years ago. This makes Great Orme Mines one of the most important finds and most certainly would have exported bronze to continential Europe.
Sunday was my final day and with work on Monday morning plus the need to get some rest before then, we stayed within Bangor and chose to visit Gastell Penrhyn, only about 1 hour and 30 minutes by foot. Owned by the National Trust, here’s their own blurb:
This enormous neo-Norman castle sits between Snowdonia and the Menai Strait. Built by Thomas Hopper between 1820 and 1845 for the wealthy Pennant family, who made their fortune from Jamaican sugar and Welsh slate, the castle is crammed with fascinating things such as a one-ton slate bed made for Queen Victoria. Hopper also designed its interior with elaborate carvings, plasterwork and mock-Norman furniture. The castle contains an outstanding collection of paintings. The Victorian kitchen and other servants’ rooms, including scullery, larders and chef’s sitting room, have been restored to reveal the preparations for the banquet for the Prince of Wales’ visit in 1894. The stable block houses an industrial railway museum, a model railway museum and a superb dolls’ museum displaying a large collection of 19th- and 20th-century dolls. The 18.2ha (45 acres) of grounds include parkland, an extensive exotic tree and shrub collection and a Victorian walled garden.
It was a bit of a pity photography wasn’t allowed, even with the flash off since usually it’s worry over “photobleaching”. Whatever the reason why, the interiors and it’s contents were more than impressive and I was rather surprised the number of oil paintings by certain “Old Masters” such as Titian, Rembrandt, Tiepolo and others… a nod towards one of my passions, Art and certainly wasn’t what I was expecting as I walked round a Welsh Castle!
Afternoon came and it was a quick dash via taxi (curse you no-show buses!) back to the house and collecting my bag of belongings to make sure I got my Virgin Train at 4:40 p.m. as I wanted to get back to Northampton for 9:02 p.m., arriving at Milton Kenyes at 8:27 p.m. for a change of trains since the express train does not stop at Northampton and thus needing another 20 minutes or so to backtrack. Still, for most of the 300km journey it was rather refreshing to be on one of the comfy, new fangled tilting trains which was capable of zipping along at some 200kmh-1!
In all, Cymru has been pretty interesting… For example, despite only 20% of the population are Welsh speaking, I was quite surprised that all signs in public places were bilingual with Welsh and English side by side. This is something I’ve not seen since leaving 香港 (Hong Kong), where the bilingualism would be English and 粵語 (Cantonese). Also, examples of “code-switching” were pretty common with varying mixtures of Welsh and English being used depending what the topic of the conversation may be. This is certainly something I’ve notice myself and other friends do when conversing with others when there is more than English as a shared language.
Oooh and last but not least, the photographs which I promised earlier. ;)
