8/9/2016 2 castles, 6 hour drive on goat tracks

This was the farmhouse living room.

The view from my bedroom

We have a lot of territory to cover today.  Starting with Caernarfon Castle.  Built by Edward I, and never finished.  This is where the investiture of the Prince of Wales takes place.  There was film of Prince Charles and the Queen.

This was a big castle with many turrets, I climbed up and down one and then said, "If you've seen one you've seen them all.

I did spend time in the lower rooms with the slide shows.  Calder was quite interested in the film showing scenes of WWI.

Picked up fluff and fold laundry had lunch and went to our next castle.  Back to Harlech Castle also built by Edward.  He was a big builder!  The original Harlech was the scene of Branwen's wedding to the King of Ireland.  

Way down below is the Y Branwen Inn where we ate last night.

Then began our 6 hour trek to Salisbury.  This part of Wales does't seem to have highways or even many two lane roads.  We went from one goat track to another smaller goat track.  I asked if the navigation system was set to take the smallest roads possible.  I had told our next innkeeper that I would get in touch when I had a good idea of our arrival time.  THERE WAS NO SERVICE UNTIL WE GOT TO A HIGHWAY STOP IN ENGLAND!

When I finally called, Gary answered with, "Joan, where are you? I've been waiting for your call all day."  When I answered, "Wales, with no service." He immediately understood.  Then I told him our ETA and he said that he would be in bed, but gave me his mobile number and said to let it ring a long time.

Dinner that night was McDonald's.  On we went.  Gary had fallen asleep in his clothes and let us in promptly.  He gave us keys, showed us our rooms, told us what time breakfast was, and went to bed.  As we were bringing in the luggage with the door open, a group of men arrived to go in.  I made them show me their key before I let them in.  Now that I think of it, 3 men could have just picked me up and moved me aside.  

8/8/2016 Exploring Branwen's Wales

JAfter the swim, we took a small walk though the woods of the castle's grounds and then checked out.

We headed for Branwen's gravestone.  Alec had goggled it and we hoped the farmer hadn't planted any tall crops in the meantime.  We waded through a field of grass and found it.  Yeh, Google.

Next we went to the very edge of the island and looked toward Ireland - where Branwen went after she married the king.  

They were having a fund raiser for birds so I added to my hedgehog collection.

Then we went to the Halen Mon sea salt factory.  It obviously was started as a way of creating jobs in the area.  The founders had had a sea food distributing business that segued into a sea zoo.  That was too seasonal, so they started the salt works.  It is small and all the packing and salt skimming are done by hand.  At the end of the tour, we had a salt tasting.  It is interesting how different they can be.

Dinner at the Y Branwen.  We had tried to stay here, but the were completely booked for a ladies international golf tournament.

We started with tomato soup which tasted like thinned marinara sauce.

Most of us had fish & chips with mushy peas

Bangers & mash.  Branwen loves mashed potatoes.  She is in heaven here.

Toberone tart for dessert.

We are staying in a farmhouse tonight.  Finding it in the dark was a treat.  The ROAD to it was 2 tracks with grass in the middle, then we turned into the drive which was even more problematic.  But we made it.  The lady was happy to see us.  I think she was worried that we weren't coming.

Family room had bunks, but since my room had twins, Calder came in with me.

8/7/2016 zoo

We spent the night at a Days Inn in Gretna Green and had Starbucks for breakfast.  (Realized that today is Sunday, so keeping with my normal life.)

We got an early start because we wanted to get to the Chester Zoo when it opened.  This is the highlight of Calder's trip.  It is the number 6 zoo in the world.

One of the reasons is that their elephants are all related, so make up a true family group.

The exhibits are fabulously done.  They recently added islands that you go around in a boat and then can walk around more. There were many baby animals as one of the criteria for a world class zoo is a good breeding program.

For all that, these were the most popular with the toddler group.

Jef wasn't feeling well, so spent most of the day in the main dining area.  Branwen was really enjoying herself until she got peed on in the bat exhibit.  We convinced her to go to see her favorite animal  ( aye-aye) with me, but she was resistant.

After Calder and Alec had seen every animal we headed off to Wales.  This is the Branwen part of the  trip.

On our way into Wales we stopped at the town with the longest name.

From the Days Inn to a castle.  What a difference!

Tre-Ysgawen had an inside swimming pool so the kids could swim before we left in the morning.

Staircase

Portrait of the owner's dead daughter.  There were about twenty five of these in different colors, but with the same face done from a photo.  The overall effect was a little creepy.

Jef having cocktails before dinner.  We drank, had nibbles, and chose our dinners here.  Then after awhile we were ushered to our table.

Sweet potato and fennel soup, seared salmon, white fish carpaccio for starters.

Fried squid on avocado on salmon, lamb, beef for mains.

A nice bowl of veggies.

Peach and raspberry trifle, except we didn't really find the peaches.

Sticky toffee pudding.

It is pleasant to just go upstairs to bed after dinner.  Alec went back to the bar to have a wee dram and some alone time.

Stewart was the bell captain.  When he heard Branwen's name, he was quite excited.  He remembered hearing the legend of Princess Branwen when he was in school.  He printed it out so she could see it.  It turned out that he also liked Calder's favorite computer game. (Zoo Tycoon). He was a big hit with all of us.

8/5/2016 Bagpipe lessons, Willow tea room, 5 Sisters Zoo

LThe kids were signed up for an introduction to bag piping.  They started learning the notes on the chanter.  This looks like a recorder but is played a little differently.

In the museum they tried the whole thing.  Much harder than it looks.  You need to blow up the bag, squeeze with your elbow for the drones, and play the notes with your fingers all at the same time in different rhythms.

Lunch at The Willow Tea Rooms designed by Macintosh.  He designed the font also.

Alec was a happy camper.

He had rarebit.

The tea tray with its 3 levels.

Went to the zoo in West CALDER.  It was small but charming.

After the zoo, we went to the train station for a photo op.

The kids were exhausted so we picked up chicken and chips take away from downstairs for them and the adults went to a pub up the street for dinner.  They had several kinds of pies which were all ready.  They just popped them on a plate with beans or mushy peas if you liked.  This was very classic pub like in books.  There was a noisy bar part and a quieter lounge/snug behind the bar with a pass through window.  We were in the lounge.

Kids ready for bed when we got back.  We all fell into bed.

8/4/2016 wandering Glasgow

We had a big day yesterday, so decided to take it easy today.  We have an apartment on the 7th floor - luckily with an elevator.  We are really liking the apartments because we can all be together, but with space to spread out.

The Scottish breakfasts are superb -  Eggs, pancakes with fresh fruit at Brown's.

We tend to visit "fan shops" all over.  The kids love to get jerseys of the teams.  Calder's is an alternative Celtic and Branwen's is Wales.  They get them pretty big and wear them for years.

Walked up to the art school that had been designed by Scotland's most famous architect, Charles Rennie Macintosh.  Alec and I had been all through it on our trip.  There had been a serious fire a few years ago (the night before the final projects for the year were due, so all of the students' work was being set up) so Alec wanted to see what was happening.  The building is being reconstructed, whew.

We visited the gallery across the street.

These signs always get us - our minds fill in an I and we think we have found a loo.

Glasgow has lovely flowers thanks to the rain.

Dinner at The Sisters.  Starters: scallops.  Mains: Ham with mash and cabbage, lamb with bean stew.  Dessert: Merangue with caramel sauce and honeycomb.

Off to bed.