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Saturday 18 May 2013

The Road to Wales

17th May - Friday



Town clock in Chester 

On the town wall, underneat the clock 

Chester Cathedral 

Typical of Chester shops 

 Didn't we have a lovely time, the day we went to Bangor ...

 On the pier

Looking towards Bangor from the pier

It has been a very, very long day!


Someone woke up before 7.00 this morning – not a good thing, especially with instant coffee for breakfast. His day became progressively worse when Doris decided to stick to the main roads this morning and we ended up back in Stoke-on-Trent. We did get to pass the JCB world headquarters and factory – what a massive place – and saw a rather large helicopter come in to land almost beside us as we drove past the administration building. As Doris was in trouble with the main roads, I re-routed her to the smaller roads – he wasn’t happy with the smaller roads either! Too narrow, too windy, too many inconsiderate drivers (or words to that effect!) – Cat and I had to cover our ears on a couple of occasions before I eventually found my last piece of chocolate to help calm him down. Let’s hope we are served proper coffee tomorrow!!!

As our route to Wales took us near the town of Wellington (home of my great-great-great-grandmother), we made a detour into this old market town – the sign over the market says it was established in 1244. The market was happening today – not much else was happening in Wellington. It was all a bit sad really. With both of us desperately in need of some coffee by this stage, we found a small place with a sign in the window that said the toilets were for customers only; neither of us really cared what the food was like – the toilet was the decider. The food and coffee did turn out to be very good.

We gave Doris her head again for the drive to Chester, but the countryside today wasn’t picturesque (like previous days), or amazing, or fantastic; it was really just ordinary farming land with hedges instead of stone fences. We used the park and ride to travel into the centre of Chester, and I think the bus driver had instant coffee for breakfast as well. The main shopping centre was just lovely, with a town wall circling the old part of the city, and the majority of the buildings were black and white. Some very nice shops – and I have never seen so many jewellery shops in such a small area.

We continued our journey into Wales and followed the coast towards Bangor, even passing through a few tunnels. Unfortunately, the weather has been very hazy, although no rain. Doris was programmed to take us to the centre of Bangor (we weren’t allowed arrive at our B & B on Anglesey before 6.00 pm), so that we could have a look around for an hour or so. The centre of Bangor, after traversing the “goat track” around the edge of the town, turned out to be a Morrisons Supermarket! By this stage, someone was getting a bit stressed again, so we decided to stop at the supermarket. Fortunately, they had a small coffee shop, so it was coffee all round again (with a Danish, of course) before we checked out the price of groceries in Wales. On our way out of the town, we did spot a sign pointing towards the pier, so back through the narrow streets to the waterfront and the pier. We had a brisk walk right to the end, taking note of the snow still on the mountains! Of course, it was back up the goat track again and across the bridge to the Isle of Anglesey and our B & B on a 550 acre farm in the middle of the island. Doris was just wonderful and took us right to the gate.

There are cows! We can see them from our bedroom window and from the window of the very large and comfortable guest lounge – the scenery is absolutely stunning (photos tomorrow). We have a very large room (Cat even has his own bed), the bathroom is nearly as big as one of the bedrooms we had early on our trip and even has a bidet, which Himself said would be very handy for doing the washing! Our hostess invited us to the lounge for a coffee after we arrived (will probably be up all night), where we met our fellow guest and the lady from next door. The quick cuppa turned into a long chat and I think we missed out on dinner somewhere.

It is really lovely here, even if I can’t pronounce the names. Doris can though, she has suddenly started speaking Welsh!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

You've captured some architectural delights there! Beryl was very much into that sort of thing before her passing.

Anonymous said...

Wild horses wouldn't have parted her and that cathedral. We never visited Chester though.