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Published: November 12th 2008
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Wales was a very windy and wet trip. I went with Alyse, Sabrina, Jessi, Andrea, and Emma, all girls from the hostel.
We started off leaving London around 8:30 Saturday morning, heading for Chepstow, Wales. We crossed the river into Wales and the sky immediately turned gloomy. The coach (sponsored by Bunac) made various stops on the way to the Brecon Beacon national park.
Chepstow was our first stop. Chepstow is right on the river Wye, seperating both Wales and England. We were able to take a picture at the point on the bridge where you can stand in the two countries at once. After taking multiple pictures in various points on the bridge guessing when we were in two countries, we finally saw the sign actually built into the bridge that said where the two countries met. duh.
After stopping for some lunch in a pub and having semi-decent fish and chips, we walked to the oldest stone castle in the UK. It had not been in use since the 1600's. We wandered around it a bit taking pictures and buying postcards until it was time to get back on the coach.
From here, it was a short drive to
Tintern Abbey. This was built back in the 1100's. As we were stopping the coach, our tourguide was explaining the importance of the abbey and the great views and blah blah blah, people worshipped here. He added if there were any interested, up the hillside was a church where those building the abbey were allowed to worship. There were rumors of witchcraft and black magic going on. Apparently there was an "accident" and the church burned, trapping people inside. The church is now in ruins. A couple of the girls and I walked right past the big abbey and headed up the hillside. The path up was steep with overgrown bricks that were covered in leaves. The church itself was incredibly creepy. It was surrounded by a cemetary of broken tombstones and do not enter signs. Only the walls of the church are still intact and the inside overgrown with trees and vines. The atmosphere was chilling. It would definitely not be a place I would want to visit at night. Gloomy skies were enough for me.
Climbing back down the path was a slow process but we finally made it and headed off in search of coffee. We stumbled
The divide between countries!
Gloucester, England and Monmouth, Wales upon a mill, which is apparently why the town is there in the first place. In one of the little shops, we got some hot chocolate with pink marshmallows. Not so good.
Once we got back on the coach, we had a semi-long drive through the extremely narrow streets of the welsh countryside. There are so many sheep! Around 4 in the afternoon, we arrived in Hay-on-Wye, otherwise known as the town of books. We got off the coach and headed straight for the fudge shop. It seems we all have a black hole inside that is always in need of chocolate. From the fudge shop we went to the castle bookshop which was just bookcases lined along the outer castle wall. It was drizzling by this point so i'm confused as to how they protect the books. There is also no one that works around the bookcases, there is a simple sign stating the 50p for paperback and £1 for hardback...put the $ in the box. From this "bookshop" we wandering into another that was a mix of antique, junk, and new books. I found a book with the elephant and swastika on the front by Rudyard Kipling. It
was obviously printed before WWII as the nazi's banned his books being published with the symbol when they came to power. I also found an antique book of travels as well as an ordinary book for my tube reading in the mornings.
At 5o'clock, everything shut down but the pubs and some cafes. We walked into a gelato shop where I got a milkshake and watched as the guy ran out of the mint gelato and proceded to double the amount of milk. I had a wonderful treat of milk with a hint of mint. sick. Alyse enlightened me that I was drinking mylanta.
45 minutes later, we left to catch the coach and the weather had turned wicked. It was rain mixed with freezing gusts of wind. A nice preview for our horse riding adventure. We arrived at our hotel/hostel in pitch blackness. We were basically in the middle of nowhere. We were told to stay on the bus while they figured out the rooms as we would be split into groups of 16 for the dorm rooms. Our tour guide returned called out the 1st group, not us, 2nd group, not us, 3rd group, not us! We were
the only ones sitting on the bus at this point. When he finally called us, we were led up all these steep stairs to the top floor. We reached our room assuming it would be shared with a random group and opened the door to show 2 rooms with 6 single beds and a bathroom! Somehow we got our own room! Unlike everyone else on the coach, we actually ended up in the hotel portion and not the hostel portion. The accomodation god has been on our side this trip.
After getting over the excitement of having our own room, we made our way to the buffet the hotel put on for us. I've learned not to eat burgers here, so I ended up with a jacket potato (baked potato) with cheese, baked beans, and ham on top. Delicious!
The hostel had a nightclub behind it, but the 6 of us headed back upstairs into our pajamas. We sat around talking for about 3 hours until one by one we each passed out. The last light went out before 11.
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