Great Britain: Part I: Welsh Weekend

Three-for-one tourist shot right there.

Just so you know, it took me about three tries to spell 'britain' correctly in that title.

Over the most recent long weekend, I took advantage of my being in Europe to see a little more of the continent. Or at least the general europe-y sort of area. Great Britain is (in case you didn't know) an island to the north of Spain, and about as far away as Seattle is from Redding CA. (600 miles) I went with fellow auxiliar Tamsin from New Zealand, although we both flew in and out of different airports on different planes at different times.

We arrived Thursday and met up at the house of Tamsin's cousin, a kiwi expat who lived in London with her husband with a broken leg. London, like it has been described to me in so many fantasy novels, was cold and gray, teeming with quaint place names and spaghetti-like streets. Somehow it managed to be cute and massive at the same time.

Tamsin and I poked around a bit on Friday, then went our own separate ways as I took the bus out to Aberystwyth, Wales, but not before learning:

new word #1: Coach: long-distance bus. ex: Greyhound is a coach company.

Aberystwyth is a small college town on the coast of Wales, home to a 19th century university, a ruined castle, hills, sheep, daffodils, and ex- fellow auxiliar Laura from Ireland. It is situated about 230 miles away from London, roughly the same distance as between Seattle and a certain town in Oregon that I as a child mistakenly believed to be the home of the famous seventeenth century witch trials.

Because the coach ride was so long, I really only had one full day in "Aber" as the locals call it. (because honestly, who can spell that?) We took advantage of it however, and saw pretty much everything the town had to offer. 

View from Constitution Hill

Castle ruins

A parade?

The day I went just happened to be St. David's day, and as such everyone was decked out in daffodils and their best Welsh duds to celebrate the patron saint of Wales. St. David, according to the town museum, is the only patron saint on the British Isles who was actually from the place he was patron of. The rest of them, (St George, St Patrick etc...) were adopted from other locations. 

The town museum also had some neat examples of woodcarving, taxidermy, and paintings of shipwrecks. 

Wales was neat, and put me in mind of a British Galicia--not only for the green rolling hills and unpredictable weather, but the presence of a bilingual community in that small, tucked-away corner of the world. It was kind of homey feeling, and made me wish I knew how to pronounce words like gŵyl. The best part though was getting to see one of my friends from the Lugo days.