On to Bath

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Today we moved on again. It was wonderful to see the sun first thing this morning. Because Bath is not all that far from Crickhowell, we planned our trip so that we could visit Caerphilly Castle and Tintern Abbey on our way to Bath. After driving down different roads again, even though we were going close to places we went yesterday- thanks to the gps- we came to Caerphilly around 11am. This castle is the biggest castle in Wales, and was another of the chain built by Edward 1 to subdue the English. It has huge defences, a double wall and moats, and a number of different gatehouses. There was also a quite large private appartment within the castle as well. We spent about an hour climbing up and down, and looking at the different parts of the castle. Parts of the castle are ruined, and one of the towers is a bit like the leaning tower of Pisa, but it is still a stunning castle, and was well worth the visit. The castle was close to a shopping centre, so we went across the road to get some lunch and some other shopping before we got on our way again. This time we set the gps to Tintern Abbey. It took about 35 minutes and we drove in and out of Wales and England before finally reaching Tintern in Wales. We began by eating our ur lunch, and then went to visit the Abbey ruins. Tintern Abbey is a very big set of buildings, like Caerphilly. The Abbey church itself is very big, and the other buildings of the Abbey spread out around the church. There are buildings for the monks to live in, other buildings for the lay workers, and also an Infirmary as well as cloisters and gardens and cooking areas. You can even see some medieval glass in one wall of the buildings. We needed to keep moving, so reluct got back into the car to drive on to Bath. We found our hotel, Dukes in Great Poutney Street, parked the car, and then went out to walk around Bath and get our bearings. We did a bit of shopping, and walked down to look at the Baths and the Bath Abbey. We discovred that chora evensong was only sung on Thursdays and Sundays. We had a few minutes before evensong started so we joined the congregation. The singing was lovely, and the inside of Bath Abbey is beautiful. It has fan vaulted ceilings, and lovely stained glass windows. After evensong, we headed back to our hotel, but decided to stop for dinner just down from our hotel at a restaurant called Herd. We enjoyed our steaks! Tomorrow we will go on a walk of the city, and perhaps go to the Baths.

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