Wales!

Hello From Wales!!

I apologize for the delay in my post. We didn’t have any internet access while in Cardiff unless you wanted to pay £28 p/hour.

Tuesday we left from London on a train which took us to Cardiff, Wales! I wasn’t quite sure what to expect when going to Wales because to be honest you don’t ever really hear much about Wales. It is beautiful!! I think I like it quite a bit better than London actually… It’s got that city feel with old architecture everywhere without the busy, rushing feeling that London has.

We stayed at the Holiday Inn which was located right next to the water, Millennium Stadium, Bute Park, and a HUGE Castle. They have a lot of really fun shops that are all located along small side streets. Each way you turn there are just more and more shops reaching sometimes up to 5 floors high along small back allies.

A couple girls and I went exploring throughout the city and we found a great little Irish pub called “O’Neils”. They played live music and have great prices! I will be uploading some of the bands we heard play on Facebook if you want to take a listen J.  On the same day we found a fabulous market! We were walking along one of the side streets and we saw a large sign that said “Cardiff Market” so we decided to check it out. What looked like a small store from the front ended up being a HUGE market full of local vendors. There were people with pastries, people making pasta on the spot, people with purses and records, people with all sorts of meats and cheeses and on and on…. It was amazing!

This morning we decided to go to the market to get breakfast. I picked up a delicious blueberry muffin and a jam filled donut both made on the spot by an older Welsh woman for only 98p! They were delicious….While we were in Wales we visits the Welsh Assembly which was pretty cool. The building is extremely eco friendly. They have large rods which reach far down into the earth to pull up heat for the building and use almost all natural light. The acoustics in the main room they meet in were pretty fascinating as well! They have what looks almost like a tunnel in the ceiling that reaches up to the roof that is surrounded by metal rods. The tunnel brings light into the room and the rods create acoustics in the room that allow the main chancellor to hear absolutely everything in the entire room. He can  hear the slightest whisper in every corner. The crazy thing is that the person next to you basically has to yell for you to hear them. It’s designed to completely eliminate any side discussion. In addition whenever someone speaks or stands there are cameras that run along the ceiling that automatically zoom in on that one person and record everything. It’s a very high tech place! We also visited a college in Cardiff and learned about how they run their student newspaper as well as a broadcasting station called S4C.

Overall the trip to Wales as fabulous! I really wish we could have stayed longer! I managed to blow my budget on rugby gear but saved on all my food because of that huge market and had a great time running through the parks and along the water. Wales is definitely a place to visit! I would recommend it to everyone J.

Now I am on a train headed for Edinburgh – which by the way no one knows how to pronounce. Not even the Irish band we met at the pub!.

As usual, check back for updates when you can! J