A Wale(s) of a Time

Well, wouldn't you know, Wales is a great place. And you wouldn't know it unless you went there. No one seems to talk about it or recommend it - it seems to be a bit of a hidden gem - so was pretty happy to stumble upon it. It certainly wasn't a planned trip - a last minute decision to take the week off after Easter, hire a car, and go for a drive around the "land of our fathers" (well, theirs anyway).

So we jumped into our luxurious Peugeot 206 (actually, it was a piece of crap and would constantly give us scares by not wanting to start, typically after making a stop in the middle of nowhere) and headed out of London. We had no idea what we were going to do, just armed with map, a Lonely Planet last used in the Dark Ages (well, 2001), and the king of travel guides - the CAMRA Good Beer Guide. Somewhere en route on the M4 the first detour was devised, a trip up the Wye Valley to visit two interesting sites - the ruins of Tintern Abbey and the Cherry Tree Inn. This would become a theme for the two days as The TripMaster would devise routes around two of his passions - medieval ruins and back country pubs.

Wye Valley was pretty cool and in our post-Iceland photographathon, neither if us thought to take a picture. So you will just have to take my word for it - it was very picturesque. I have got a shot here of the Tintern Abbey though, which was also quite impressive. It was here that we first implemented our cunning plan to avoid paying the £3-£5 entry fees for such attractions by just walking around the outside of them. I always prefer the outsides anyway, the insides are usually not as impressive and often you get some garish attempt to replicate internal furnishings. After a pleasant walk around the Abbey, we spent lunch at attraction number two - though The Cherry Tree Inn was so good, it will get its own posting.

After Wye Valley, we headed off into Brecon Beacons National Park (via another castle ruin of course). Despite the tongue twisting nature of its name, we really liked the BBs. It was here that we also first saw the star attractions of our trip - the spring lambs. They were everywhere, green fields sprinkled with little white dots. It was good to see that at least someone in Britain understands that the purpose of a farm is to have animals on it - in sharp contrast to the fields in England, where the standard appears to be one cow or sheep per 100 acres of land. That day and the next morning we simply spent driving around the little country roads in the BBs, frequently getting lost, but frequently coming across great countryside vistas. It reminded me somewhat of the Yorkshire Dales, but also of the NZ rural countryside - though a lot more picturesque.










That night I also got introduced to another highlight of Wales - Welsh Black Beef. This was without doubt the best steak I have ever had - and it wasn't even a fillet cut (it was rib-eye). It just had a delicious smoky flavour to it and it was perfectly cooked to my rare order (which is rare in itself). This was followed by an enormous B&B breakfast the next morning - the biggest I have ever seen, and subsequently (of course), the biggest I have ever eaten.

Departing the BBs a kilo or two heavier, we headed off from one National Park to another, this time the Pembrokeshire Coast NP. And this probably topped the Brecon Beacons. Stunning scenery again, great castle ruins, and of course, cool pubs. We also managed to find ourselves a room at a B&B located on a farm in the middle of nowhere. The very Welsh lady who ran it was a hoot, I think she laughed more than she talked - which was just as well, as we couldn't understand half of what she said anyway. She set us up to go to a local pub where I could have, you guessed it, Welsh Black Beef, and also gave me directions to a pub I was most keen to track down - the Dyffryn Arms, which most definitely deserves its own post.


After a night on what must be the most uncomfortable and noisy bed I have slept on - beating the bunk bed in Dublin with half the slates missing and the squeak-machines we got at the San Luis Obispo hostel - we used our last day to drive up to Snowdonia National Park before heading back to London. More a whistle stop through Snowdonia, as we had to head back to London that night, but still got a good look around. Again, great scenery, yadda, yadda, yadda - I think you are getting the picture that we really like this country.
In all, 3 National Parks visited, 7 ruins, 9 pubs, 2 Welsh steaks, 1 million lambs, and 18 new beer ratings. Overall, an unexpected brilliant three days in Wales. I would have loved another couple of days and it would be great to get the opportunity to go back. I certainly recommend it to others.

For some more pics, click here.