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Published: September 12th 2012
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We arrived in Conwy to a great older house B&B up on the hill looking over at the walled city. Our room is at the front of the house with a view of a park, the city wall and the castle. The home's gardens terraced down to the road are a wonderful addition. It is just a couple of blocks walk to the entry to the village.
Conwy is on the coast. The next morning we woke to drizzle and decided to drive down toward the slate mine to visit the slate museum. This museum is free and is really worth the time to visit. It has a well done video presentation and a live demonstration of splitting the slate. They have brought in 4 cottages each decorated in the 50 year increments to show how the slate miners lived through the last 200 years.
When we left the museum we drove through the country side and out to Holyhead. The weather had cleared and out came the sunglasses. Holyhead is the village at the farthest western point of Wales. We found a maritime festival and walked along the promenade. This is a beach location for the locals with
ice cream stands and of course a pub. There were lots of families out enjoying the day.
That night we went back into Conwy for dinner at the local Italian Restaurant. Great food and wonderful service. It amazes me to realize how small this world really is. As we talk to people there seems to be a probability that they know someone living in Washington state or they have visited our home territory.
The next morning dawned with clear skys. Conwy's castle ruin is in the north east corner along the wall of this vibrant town overlooking the sea. We visited the ruins taking in the astounding views from the top of the towers. As we walked the top of the city wall we found a new vista at each turn.
And then it was off to Liverpool and our ferry adventure. Liverpool is a big city; semi-hard to find your way as we came out of the tunnel under the Mersey river. But we finally found the Albert Dock area and a pint... (no kidding). We took in the museum and then of course another pint. Now on to finding our ferry to Ireland. This turned
into a monumental issue until we finally asked the man at the port security gate. He said “Come on in and turn right and keep going – you'll run into the P&O line.” No joke – no showing tickets just let us in to their gated port area.
After waiting for boarding time, we finally got our car on and parked among all the semi trucks (including backing up at least 6 car lengths). Up to our en-suite cabin and then on to the dinner provided. Tried to get right to sleep because we were up by 4:30am to unload in Dublin at 5:15am.
New adventure... we got down to the car and a fellow passenger pointed out that our rear tire was almost flat... No way... it's dark... it's raining... we're on a ferry with about 60 trucks and maybe 15 autos.. and we have no idea how to find our way to someplace to get it fixed.
We drove off the ferry and wove our way through the streets near the dock and finally found an open gas station. We put some air in the tire and bought a Dublin map. It was holding air
so now it is off to try to find our hotel and maybe park our car there for the day before we check in. But once again the travel gods come through for us. We can check in early and bonus – the day manager knows about a local car repair shop that helps us with our tire. after the detour to the repair shop we are now ready to begin our Dublin fun...
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