I wanted to start with this photo of Cardiff in English and Welsh. I have always heard that Welsh is hard to understand. Caerdydd is Cardiff by the way. We spent one whole day in Cardiff and then another day we did a tour that took us out into the countryside. As have other cities, Cardiff developed a fun way to raise awareness and money for a charity (a dog based one no less). A trail of decorated Snoopys! See a couple below.
The first place we visited was Cardiff Castle. Which by the way, the Cambridges just went there as part of the Queen's Jubilee celebration. Anyway, Cardiff Castle is owned by the city of Cardiff after it was given to them by the Marquess of Bute. Cardiff castle was originally built by the Romans and has been rebuilt several times. The tour starts underground in an area where they have found some of the original Roman walls. On the opposing wall, a mural of sorts was built a few years ago showing the history that has happened at the castle. I say mural of sorts because it is all wood carvings.
Miscellaneous pictures from the castle
The wood carvings and the Roman wall
From the Roman Wall, we went to the "house". This part of the castle was extensively rebuilt by the Third Marquess of Bute in the 1800s. To say the least it is elaborate. At that time, he was the richest man in the world thanks to the coal mining industry. Not only did he fix the castle up and live in it, he also made many donations to the city of Cardiff and helped it grow into a city.
ceiling and wall of a grand hall
chapel
dining hall
The Marquess did not rebuild all of the castle. The Keep is still very much a medieval building. Fun to explore, but not ornate like the house. We also visited the exterior walls of the castle and saw the air raid shelters that had been built into the walls during World War II.
In front of the Keep
Inside the Keep
After we finished exploring the castle, we did a Hop On Hop Off bus to see the rest of the city. As the capital of a country, it has a parliament and a national museum and a university.
Additionally there is a waterfront area. One of the performing arts centers is new. Its exterior is meant to represent Wales both its natural and industrial landscape. It is made up of steel and slate and is situated in the bay/waterfront area. While we only drove by, it was impressive from the outside.
Wales Millennium Center
Towards the end of the bus ride, we were coming up on the National Museum and one of the descriptions used was: has the most French Impressionist paintings outside of France. I enjoy impressionist paintings. We went in and enjoyed the paintings and then explored the area that talked about the ancient beginnings of Wales - talking geology here. We only had a few minutes before we had to leave to catch the last bus and the museum was closing. It would be a good place to spend some time in the future.
First sign we saw for the Jubilee - in train station on the way home.
One of many small shopping arcades spread throughout Cardiff
Our second trip to Wales was for a small group day trip that took us on a quick tour of Cardiff then on to Coch Castle, Caerphilly Castle, Beacons National Park and the small town of Brecon.
Our guide called Coch Castle a fairy tale castle because it was never really a castle. Rather it was a rich man's country estate built to look like a castle. The rich man was the Marquess of Bute as in Cardiff castle. Today this castle is owned by the Welsh government and is a popular place for weddings - we saw one getting ready while we were there. We did not enter this castle, but rather walked around the outside. It is out in a forest/woody area which is what the Marquess wanted since he was looking for a country escape/hunting lodge.
Our next stop was Castle Caerphilly. This is the second largest castle in Great Britain - only Windsor is larger. It is a true castle having had many fights fought within its walls. It has not one but two moats with some islands in them. The castle was first built in 1268. As you can tell from a couple of the following pictures it is huge! We were able to explore a lot of the castle. I suspect on a regular basis they are restoring/maintaining parts of the castle. While we were there, one of the towers was off limits and covered in scaffolding. There is a tower that is leaning - I mean really leaning and is called the leaning tower. Jeff noticed it has a large iron pole supporting it these days. We also explored the dragons lair while we were there. It has a story about dragons and a couple of fake ones in the pen area. Dragons are important to the Welsh - the flag has a dragon on it.
Crossing the moat to enter
Today
leaning tower is on the left
within the castle walls
think this was the king's area upstairs
dining room in great hall
More great hall
Dragons!
2 minute drone video depicts vastness of the castle
After the two castles it was off to one of Wales' national parks. There are only 3 national parks in the country. The park is Brecon Beacons National Park. We had about an hour to wander around the park. Like much of the UK there were easy to follow walking paths in a field going up a couple of hills. We could see they went on a lot longer then we had time to enjoy. One thing that caught our eye was that some of the sheep had been shorn. It was the first time we had seen sheep that were not full of fur/hair.
shorn sheep
After the stop at the park, we went to the nearby small town for a little refreshment before we returned to Cardiff and caught our train back to Bristol.
We are staying in Bristol while visiting it in addition to Bath and Cardiff, Wales. In a recent Rick Steves article about traveling to Europe in 2022, he suggested visiting Bristol rather than Bath to avoid crowds. Well we had always planned on staying here, but I am not sure why he would not have you visit Bath since it is less than 20 miles away or in our case 1 train stop. Bristol is a true city whereas Bath is a tourist town. Even our guide in Bath said until recently only retirees were living there - it is now starting to pick up again as a place to live.
We are staying in a short term apartment that is a AirBnB in a part of town that like a couple of other areas is undergoing a lot of growth (lots of high rise construction). We are less than half a mile to the train station and to the riverfront where there is a lot of activity.
I said river above, but they call it a harbor actually they call it the floating harbor which I could not understand until the captain of our boat ride explained it all. The harbor is a busy place these days with tourists. Originally there was a port for cargo and had a large shipbuilding contingent too.
They kept the old cranes for unloading cargo as part of the tourist area so you can see both a steam run crane and electric ones. The second Sunday we were in town, they had both of them open for tourists/children to check out for small fees. In addition to the cranes, there are old ships, canal type boats, ferries, and a museum. When I say ships, there are a variety of old ships that had ties to Bristol - mostly having been built there. The oldest is a remake of a wooden sailing vessel the Mathew. Its significance is that it was used by John Cabot on a voyage where he discovered Newfoundland Canada.
Mathew replica of John Cabot’s 1497 ship that sailed to Newfoundland
You move up a few hundred years or so to the SS Great Britain. It was built and designed in Bristol. Bristol's favorite son Isambard Kingdom Brunel designed the ship. It was the first of its kind by combining several innovations. First, its a metal hulled steam ship. If you notice, it does have sails on it too to take advantage of fair winds and backup. Many people did not believe the ship would be able to float let alone make it across the ocean. Second, it was also one of the first ships with a propeller instead of a paddle wheel which enabled great speed. Supposedly people were shocked when it showed up in New York City in 14 days vs several weeks significantly faster than any other ship. This speed enabled the first class to enjoy fresh food, making it the first luxury liner. There was one problem for Bristol with the ship though - it was too big for their harbor at the time so it meant the beginning of the end of the usefulness of the floating harbor.
Great 9 min video on the first ocean liner SS Great Briton
Now what is this floating harbor you ask? Well as you look at it from the shore it appears to be a normal harbor. You have to go out toward the sea to discover the difference. In Bristol as in much of England, there is a significant difference in tide levels - we are talking 17 feet or more twice a day in Bristol. Tides that different meant that the large ships had to be unloaded and restocked quite quickly or they would end up sitting on the mud aground. This is not a good thing for an area that is trying to become a major shipping port. Oh I should add this waterway is the River Avon which then continues on to Bath. So the good people of Bristol dug an alternate route for the river around the port so that it still flowed and then built a lock and dam to hold the water to a height that kept the ships floating in the harbor. Thus the floating harbor. Our captain said a couple of times a year the tide gets higher than the dam so they open the gates and leave them open for a few days a year.
Loch circled in blue, alternate route to right
As I mentioned we took a boat ride one day, a 4 hour tour of the Avon River Gorge on a canal boat. On this trip, we went through the locks, past the Clifton suspension bridge, along the gorge past a couple of towns, saw the new commercial port and then stuck our ship's nose in the sea since it was a calm day. Happily it was a sunny, pretty day for the boat ride.
Ships were required to unload their gun powder here before entering the harbor
With the Mathew in the lead, we journey through the gorge
As I mentioned above there are also canal boats and ferries at the harbor. Many of the canal boats are residences for people. We saw boats with flower pots and elaborate decorations set up on roofs or their little out door areas most appeared to be permanent residences, but we saw a couple that were short term rentals. The last type of boat at the harbor were the ferry boats. The River Avon goes through a major portion of Bristol and while there are quite a few very nice pedestrian bridges there are also a couple of long stretches where there is no easy access or if you want to go aways along the river hence the ferry boats.
View of the floating harbor
canal boat full of flower pots
Below is a collage of pictures of the various pedestrian bridges across the river in Bristol. One of them is a drawbridge, another is a big zigzag and some are just a nice normal bridge.
Bristol is a very "green" city, it is where a national network of bicycle trails was started and while we were there, they were having a walking festival. So on one of our first days in town, we did a self guided hike around town. We started out towards the harbor and then crossed it where we found their main performing arts theatre and a street food site. The street food side had a changing group of food vendors which was good because it provided lunch twice. I had a really good grilled cheese sandwich with sausage and tomatoes in the cheese and Jeff had a Mediterranean dish one day. After we were fueled up we started walking up the hills to more of the city. There is some very nice street art on some of the buildings as seen below. We walked around their city library, couple of old churches including the cathedral and the University of Bristol which has some nice, interesting old buildings. Below Jeff put together another collage of photos this time from our walk.
The above building was on our walk too, but I wanted to point it out. I don't remember who now, but a leading citizen of Bristol built this building as an alms house - a place for people who were broke to live. Nearby there are a series of steps up the hill called the Christmas steps which is where some of those residents sold things to raise money. To this day, the area is known for its neat independent shops.
Guess we did not get enough hill climbing after one day, so on another day we did a hike up to the Clifton Suspension Bridge. We did cut a little off by taking a ferry though. The Clifton Suspension Bridge is one of the well known sites of Bristol. It is old for a suspension bridge and it crosses the Avon River Gorge. Our plan was to hike there, eat and then hike down the opposite site which is a parkland. We did that, but I goofed. I knew that the lido had an excellent restaurant and that it was by the bridge did we eat there? No I let Jeff lead the way and followed him to the observatory where we had a basic sandwich - but a nice view. Before we actually crossed the bridge, we went down into the hillside to a cave that gives a great view of the area. In the picture below yellowish/orange lines are the railing for the cave and its overlook. After we crossed the bridge we walked through a very nice neighborhood and then found a park with a path that took us down to basically river level on the opposite site and back to the floating harbor.
Clifton Suspension Bridge completed in 1864
As I mentioned above, Isambard Kingdom Brunel is a favored son of Bristol. He lived there in the 1800s - he never saw the Clifton bridge completed but he had figured out how to build it. He also invented several other things such as:
Rotherhithe Tunnel under the Thames with an innovative shield design that saved construction workers lives
Portable hospitals for the Crimea war that Florence Nightingale referred to as those “wonderful huts.”
Giant steam ships and the SS Britton mentioned above.
The Great Western Railway from London to Bristol including Paddington Station that we traveled through on our journey.
Many bridges including the Clifton Suspension bridge that we saw from all sides when we hiked up one side and down the other.
Current day, Bristol has another famous son. The artist Banksy. He first did his street graffiti in Bristol before moving on to other forms of art. For us, that meant another guided walk to find some of this artwork. We found 3 peices that were relatively close to where we were staying. There is also one in the Watershed museum on the harbor.
Banksy
On anther day, we decided to go for a bike ride. The bike store said oh it is 5 minutes from here to the trail that goes from Bristol to Bath. Um yeah it is 5 minutes if you know where you are going - longer if you have trouble finding the route when there is a diversion (detour to us in USA). When we found the trail, we enjoyed ourselves. While we both agreed it would be nice to go all the way to Bath, we knew we had not ridden bikes for a couple of months and there was this thing here called hills which we were not used to and on unfamiliar bikes. In the end, we stopped a little over half way when we saw an interesting place to explore and to get lunch. It was the Britton and Avon Valley Railway. We literally had to open a gate and walk our bikes across the train tracks to continue on the trail so of course we had to stop and check it out!
In honor of Centenary College of LA and my methodist friends, I made a point of visiting the "new Room." I read about in a guidebook in our room. Seems that John Wesley first started preaching in Bristol - his father had been a preacher with the Church of England. Wesley preached more to the common, working class people of the time. So today there is chapel in the middle of a street of an outdoor shopping mall. The first floor is the chapel with a museum above. While visiting the shopping mall, one day I realized there were statues in back. I found the placards in the chapel interesting. I learned that his brother Charles wrote over 6,000 hymns including a couple I recognized (Christ the Lord is Risen Today and the Christmas Carol Hark the Herald Angels Sing). The other interesting fact I learned was that when he went to the USA, he went to the state of Georgia.
While we stayed in Bristol, Bath is only 10 to 15 miles away so we visited it too on a couple of occasions. Our first visit included a walking tour of Bath and a concert that evening that was part of their Bath Festival. Bath is a very touristy town. People visit here to see the old Roman baths and the Georgian architecture that is persuasive throughout the town. The town's architecture is well known and used as the backdrop for many period pieces such as Bridgerton and Sanditon in current times.
We met up with our tour group by the Bath Abbey which is a medieval church. The outside has some interesting carvings like angels climbing up a ladder - except one which is looking down.
Image on left is builders symbol that conveys his name Image on right of angels ascending or descending
We walked along the main street where the baths were and stopped at a man whole cover so we could all hear the water rushing by. Then it was on to a nearby side street. The street is used in the filming of the show Bridgerton. In fact, we were in front of the fictional home of the Bridgerton family. Hadn't seen the show in over a month at the time, but it did seem familiar to me.
Frequent location for Netflix Brigerton
This website will show you many of the Bridgerton Filming locations in Bath. In addition to pointing out TV and film sites, we saw the front and back of their circus and the crescent. A circus is a building or set of buildings build in a circular format. So whereas in London Picadilly Circus is a commercial area, this one is homes. The homes are connected like row houses and each has a nice backyard. We got to walk into a yard that is set up as they believe it would have been when the home was built in Georgian times.
back yard of one of the circus homes
front view of the circus homes
The crescent homes were built in the shape of a crescent and have a great lawn in front of them. When they were originally built, the large front yard was separated with an area for sheep, Since the rich people would not want the sheep in their nice area, they included a heehaw. A heehaw is like a short wall or a way to terrace the upper yard so the animals could not get up to the nice area. Today the homes are a mixture of expensive individual homes, some have been separated into flats and a few have been combined into a small hotel. The end unit is now a museum.
view of the Royal Crescent and its lawn
The tour ended at the Pultaney Bridge which is important because it includes shop in the bridge itself. The bridge is over the River Avon which is not pronounced like the cosmetic copany. The A is short and the "on" is pronounced more like "in" and by the way there are several river avons in England because avon meant river in welsh. After the tour we had time before the concert so it was time for a Pint in a scenic spot.
looking back at Pulteney Bridge
Pulteney Bridge
We ended the day at the Forum for the Concert for the People of Bath which was the Bath Philharmonia with the Band of Her Majesty's Royal Marines School of Music and 2 soloists. The concert included a couple of our favorite composers - John Williams and Aaron Copland so it was a nice ending to our day.
On our second visit to Bath, we emphasized the bath part of bath. As in we visited a various nice modern day spa and the roman baths.
We weren't allowed to take photos of the news spa, but it was an enjoyable couple of hours and would recommend it. A few years ago it was decided that the water was not entirely safe so they started to treat it with a little chlorine to kill microbes that were living in it. It is still hot and still has all the minerals just a little modernized. The spa has several floors with a pool on the rooftop and they talk about how the steam coming off the water can make the experience even more special. There wasn't any steam on our day or minimal, but we enjoyed ourselves then we went down a couple of floors to where they had a variety of steam rooms including one with a celestial theme including a video that we could not watch long because we were about to go to sleep. Then down to the bottom floor for another pool. This one was warmer and had a current in it in addition to an area with jets like a hot tub. It was fun and then it was time to move on. The place is called Thermae Spa and if you click here you can take a virtual tour or enjoy the photos. The numbers 1-4 in the top right margin enable you to select the different floors to explore.
The Roman Baths are why Bath is a UNESCO site. Amazingly the baths had been lost for years and was even built upon. The baths are 2,000 years old and after the Romans some of England's Kings and Queens used the baths for their restorative and medical abilities. The baths have been returned to the way the romans had them set up except that the main bath had a roof over it back then. Today the water is green because it has algae growing in it.
In Roman times, the baths was a large site that included areas for both bathing and for religious purposes. The area was called Aqua Sulis. The museum that has been built up around the baths walks you through rooms where there were saunas and cleaning areas and in the religious areas. They have many artifacts some complete and pieces of others to help decipher how the romans used the area.
Projection completes the missing pieces
Earlier I mentioned that on the tour we stopped at a spot in the street where you can hear the water running underneath. That was right outside the door of a private spa area that can be reserved for groups. We were able to peak in and the picture is below.
