Monday 11th
August PEMBROKE - TREDEGAR HOUSE -
CHEPSTOW - BRISTOL
Yet another
big travel day today, across Pembrokeshire, Carmarthenshire, Monmouthshire and finally
back into England.
I had just
woken up shortly after half past seven (excellent sleep in) when Cait and Danny
called, so I chatted to them while I made my tea and ate my toast. Then we
finished our packing, checked we had done everything, and drove off right on 9
o’clock.
Today’s
travel was all on the major roads once we’d left the Pembroke area – excellent for
getting places in a hurry, with double lanes for overtaking, but not brilliant
for sight-seeing, as they all tend to have buffer zones of trees planted, or
high banks surrounding them. At any rate, we had left the pretty and dramatic
Welsh scenery behind, as we drove closer to the big industrial cities of
Swansea and Cardiff especially.
Lex had set our first stop for the day a two-hour drive away, at Tredegar House, a lovely Tudor/16th century/17th century grand house just off the M4 near Cardiff. It is generally felt to be the finest Restoration period house in Wales and is now owned by the National Trust, so our parking and admission cost nothing. We’d actually been there in 2014, for the same reason – a travel day with time to kill. But that day, it was pouring with rain the whole time, so we didn’t get to see any of the grounds at all. It was lovely to be there on a pleasantly warm, sunny day instead. Tredegar was the home of the Morgan family, who were big in Welsh politics for centuries, until the usual story – a descendent who frittered away the family fortune. Evan Morgan, who died in 1949, went through the money with wild living and attempts to practise black magic. Aleister Crowley, England’s most infamous occultist, was a friend and used to visit (nasty!) After that, the house became a girls’ and then a co-ed school, until the Trust acquired it.
We had morning tea in the old stables, and a good browse through the second-hand bookshop in another old stable block. I donated a novel I’d just finished, and we both have books to continue our journey with! Then Lex went off for a walk around the grounds, and I headed back to the house to see it again. It is very, very impressive, with some beautiful rooms. These are presented in different periods, so the entrance rooms are Restoration (mid to late 1600s), the next wing is Victorian, and the bedrooms are 1920s. The kitchens are Edwardian, so there’s a good spread of eras in the house.
After I’d
left the house, I walked towards the lake, and met up with Lex. The gardens are
really showing the need for rain; a lot of Wales has been declared in drought
at present. And of course they don’t mulch their plants, so that doesn’t help. We
admired the swans, then decided we’d travel on to Chepstow, a half hour away,
for lunch.
Lex's photo of the lake
Chepstow is a very old town in Monmouthshire, and the castle there dates back to very early in the Norman occupation. A lot of the town’s stone walls are still there, and there’s a town gate that was built in the 1200s, then restored in the 1500s and again last century. We’d visited very briefly in 2006 – it was cold and dark, being December, so it was lovely to see it in summer. We set a course for the Wetherspoon’s there, the very pretty Bell Hanger. After a lovely late lunch, we went for a walk through the mall area and up to the town gate and to look at the remaining stone walls.
By then it was late enough that we could book into our next accommodation, so we travelled off back to the M4, and across the bridge over the Severn River inlet. This is huge, and it was obviously low tide as we drove across. Goodbye Wales, hello again England! From there it was only another half an hour into the centre of Bristol where our accommodation is.
We’re in a private court, with an electric gate to get in. We have a ground floor flat, which is good in that it was very easy to whip all our luggage inside, but bad because it means we really can’t open any windows. Security screens seem to be completely unknown to the British, sadly. And we are in the grip of what they are calling a heat wave. Bristol got to 30 today, but is set to get to 33 tomorrow, and that could be nasty with everything closed up. But at least there are big fans in the rooms, and a ventilation system which is circulating the air. We shall see how we survive. I’m just overjoyed that I’ve been able to wear summer clothes and footwear, and have dug out a pair of shorts to put on!
Since we arrived, we’ve popped out to the nearest Co-op to get groceries for the next 3 nights (a maze of medieval lanes and winding streets). I saw something there I’ve never seen before – the steak (as in fillets etc) is stored in clear lock-boxes in the fridge that I assume you have to have unlocked at the till! Steak is so expensive here – I swear I’m going to have it three times a week when we get home. Lex has gone for a walk down to the river and to find Brunel’s famous suspension bridge. We’ve never been to Bristol before, so there’s lots to explore.
We’re nearing the end of our adventure; we only have a few more moves in the south of England before we give the car back and head into London for ten days or so, then we’ll be on the plane home. It will seem very strange to not be packing up and moving every few days, but I have to say I’m really looking forward seeing all our family and friends, and getting back to my own bed!
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