Here's a link to Gigapan, a fun site I newly surfed to this evening. It's not the home page, but I love this view, since it shows what I didn't get to see when I trekked up Pen-y-Fan in South Wales in a fog on April Fool's Day, 1989.
Try the Search bar! Virtual trips for one and all!
Saturday, 1 April, 1989
Aberbran to Brecon to Holford, Somerset
Day Sixteen
Yesterday evening Mrs. Jones told me they’ve had 400 ewes in lamb the past week, plus another 150 owned by their son David (David Jones-- now that’s a charming name) [particularly for an old Monkees fan]. As I looked out my window onto the farm court when I got up around 8:30, I could see from the people crisscrossing it that they were hard at it.
I finished dressing and breakfast by 9:30, and then took Mrs. Jones up on her offer to see a bit of the livestock.
She took me first into the sheep shed, where they’d put the ewes that’d recently given birth. "This one here was born just an hour ago." It was a wet little black thing, still being licked dry by its mother, the remains of the umbilicus dangling from its little belly. The ewe trims that off herself. I asked, and so far they’ve had no trouble with mothers rejecting their young.
Sheep, meaning sheep dung, smell different than cattle. It’s kind of a sweetsy smell. It might be a bit much if you didn’t get used to it.
Next we went to the cattle shed, where the Charolais cattle, all blond with knobby heads, were feeding. The Joneses had taken them in for fattening. They also have a few Herefords but the Charolais is the coming breed and the former are becoming more rare. I told her about the Hereford Association and its icon in Kansas City.
That shed also housed some ewes who were on the verge of giving birth. But none were ready immediately.
Paid my lodging and departed sometime after 10:00. Headed up the road to Brecon. I stopped first at the Post Office in its suburb of Llanfaes (yes, Brecon has an official suburb or two) to ask where I could find a card phone. The man told me where there was one in Brecon proper, but warned me it might be a little difficult to drive to it because of the parade.
And so it was. Streets closed and bobbies routing traffic round and round the narrow streets. I finally found a place where I could leave the car, and went back and asked a policeman. All in order, found the phone where he said and called down to Somerset about lodging for the next four nights. Place I wanted was full but the man suggested another not too far away, in a town called Holford, that was going for £8 a night. Called there and made my reservation.
That done, I headed back to the main square to watch the parade. It was really just a marching of the local militia, attended by the City Fathers in their regalia. But the band played and then the 43rd, I think, Brecon Infantry marched by (with their mascot goat) and everyone cheered. I must admit that thoughts of IRA and Welsh Nationalist terrorists crossed my mind, but nothing untoward happened. The ranks marched off down the street and the crowds dispersed.
I headed for the National Westminster (solely by means of guesswork) to cash some traveller’s cheques. It wasn’t till I got there and found it closed that I remembered it’s Saturday. So I used the cash machine out front. £20 out.
Just as I finished, the town officials, the band, and the regiment marched around again, to the cheers and appreciation of the re-formed crowd.
Took my time going back to the car. Bought some postcards in a souvenir shop but didn’t see anything else I couldn’t live without.
The husband of the couple staying at the B&B had climbed the Beacons yesterday and told me last night how to approach them by car. So I took the A470 southwards and soon found the turnoff for the Mountain Center.
They wanted 50p for the parking lot. Oh. Didn’t have it. When I went in to get change, the info officer told me that actually, to do the Beacons I needed the Mountain Rescue Post, farther down the A470. Though he wasn’t sure they would be worth climbing today, as visibility seemed rather low. I assured him it looked better outside than it did through his window, and asked if he thought I should wear my heavy coat or my nylon mac with extra sweaters beneath. He recommended the latter.
So. Found the right carpark, off the road opposite the roadhouse called the Story Arms. Put everything I figured I’d need in my backpack and headed across the highway. Beside the gate was one of the omnipresent British TeleCom phone boxes, though whether it was working is a tossup.
Over the stile and up the hill. Except for a planted coniferous forest on my right, there were no trees in view. The trail, such as it was, was rather muddy, and I was not thrilled to see how quickly I was getting tired. Even more fun when I got part way up the first bit of hill and decided, well, maybe I should go back and get my flashlight and my Swiss Army knife . . . .
So I retrieved them and began trudging up again. Got going at about 1:30. There were some other parties within sight, some of them were Army men. A few of them were stowing their gear into vans in the carpark when I went back.
There were two types of trails marked on my Ordnance Survey map-- one in black dashes, that cut more or less perpendicular to the contours, and one in red dots, that swung round an easier, more gradual way. Going by my seeming lack of stamina today, I decided to take the easier route, though it was the longer way around.
Going from by prior experience of hiking trails, there wasn’t much of one up this hillside. It was more of a system of ruts and gullies, some with water and some without, only distinguishable as a path by the innumerable bootmarks. Some pretty ill-placed bootmarks in some places, too. I’m getting practiced enough to know to go for the rocks and tussocks-- I’ve never heard yet that mud is very good for suede.
I read something somewhere that said not to absolutely trust even the Ordnance Survey maps. I could see now why they said that. There were a number of stone walls on that hill that weren’t even marked and it would’ve been very helpful to know how far I’d come.
Pretty soon I saw no others besides myself. It was very gray weather anyway and I got to thinking how hill climbing is so often a matter of faith. Earlier, at best, it’d looked like it did the day I drove up to Conques, as if I just might break out into sunlight if I went high enough.
After a time I came to a fence with a stile. Before I reached it two Army guys crossed it, coming back. Their hair was sopping wet and I wondered if it was raining on the top. If so, I hoped it’d stop by the time I got there.
On further, and I came to a stream (Nant in this neck of the woods). This was not how it was marked on my map-- unless-- oh, oh, yes-- I had taken the steeper trail after all. Yes, I had. Well, always one to make things difficult . . . Picked my way across as best I could, thankfully avoiding stepping into the water itself, then followed the ruts on up the hill.
My hopes of a clear day after all seemed to be waning. The wind picked up and drifts of fog blew down in visible trails off the top of the mountain. It was possible that meant all would soon be clear above, but I doubted it. The valley below became so fogged in I could not see where I’d been. All around me it was incredibly quiet, except for the songs of birds. Above me a lark, barely discernible through the mist, sang out her song of exultation as if the gloominess of the day hadn’t the least effect on her.
The fog grew thicker. But I wasn’t really worried, since the track, such as it was, was disgustingly plain. There was no missing that scar, as if some large vehicle with a variable wheelbase had ripped up the side of the hill, the gullies ornamented with boot tread marks. It was essential to keep an eye on it, though, because you never could tell when the solid place on which you trod would peter out into a water-filled hole.
Tried singing "Jesus, Lover of My Soul" (Tune: Aberystwyth) but I’ve never learned all the verses. Frustrating. "Once to Every Man and Nation" (Ton-y-Botel) comes easier:
"Toiling up new Calvaries ever,
With the cross that turns not back."
Came to a cross path, added my stone to the cairn that marked the junction and, having checked the map, took the fork to the right up to the summit of Bwlch Duwynt. Part way along there, two other silhouettes came looming out of the fog ahead of me, coming up a path that converged on mine. I immediately remembered Carcassonne and hung back till the two, both men in bright orange macs, had passed by.
I was able to relax a little, though, when I passed through the fog to that summit and practically stumbled over a family sitting there in the damp eating their lunch. And more people were coming down from the top of Pen y Fan, the highest of the Beacons.
It’s about another kilometer to that, according to the map. At this point you’re walking along a ridge with a pretty good drop on your right hand, or eastward, side. And that’s where all the storm was coming from. And by now it was getting to be a real storm, with strong winds and rains. But I was already this close to the top that it seemed silly to turn back, even if I couldn’t see five feet ahead of me. I could see the cairns marking the path on the lefthand side, and feel the path as it sloped gradually upwards. As long as that was so I knew I couldn’t get wrong and I was still on the way to the 886 [meter; 2,907 foot] summit.
Pretty soon, after passing others coming back, I caught sight of the two men I’d seen before, standing by a monstrous cairn. The trail no longer went upwards and I said, "Is this it?"
Yes, I was told. And they headed down.
I stood there a moment or two despite the sleet, allowing myself time to actually be there at the top-- and despite there being no view whatsoever. The cameras were useless.
So I put them in my pack and turned to go. The two men were standing by the side of the trail, pulling on their waterproof trousers. They hailed me, and, seeing that they were two whitehaired men in their 70s, I decided they were ok. Besides, there were tons of others around, fog or no.
They were both Welsh, local; one was Vernon and the other Roy. They’ve climbed these hills in all weathers and always put on their foul weather gear when their regular trousers get wet. They decided I needed more protection and pulled out a spare mac and insisted I put it on.
So it fell out that we went down together, talking as we went. As we approached the path back to the summit of Bwlch Duwynt, one of them said, "All right, which way do we go now?"
I, having to be a showoff, took no time to consider or check the map-- and promptly chose the wrong way (couldn’t see the right way, actually). At which I got a short lecture about wondering around in the fog by myself. The silly thing is, if I’d been by myself, I wouldn’t’ve been so glib and thoughtless about it.
As we went, I bore with their chiding me for wearing cotton jeans-- they said I should have worn my wool flannels, at least. Learned all sorts of things, such as that Vernon’s daughter and grandson live in Connecticut, and he’s a science major and a certified genius but was turned down by Cal Tech. Did I think that was because he’s from Great Britain? I really couldn’t say. And Vernon’s been to Connecticut, but doesn’t like it-- "It’s a jungle." I thought he was speaking of the urban jungles of New Haven or Hartford but he clarified, "There’s too many trees. You can’t see anything. No point in walking there at all."
Well, you can’t accuse Brecon of that fault. But I tried to explain that there can be real excitement in breaking out above a timberline. He does approve of Martha’s Vineyard, though. Only place he’d be willing to stay.
They told me that fifteen-twenty years ago when they first started hiking the Beacons, this monstrous rutted track under our feet was just a little sheep trace. "Now they call it the M4," said one.
"The mountain’s popularity is killing it," said the other.
Vernon complained about how the US National Parks all charge admission. I felt it would be useless to point out that yes, but that money goes to pay for trail upkeep. You’d never have an eroded disgrace like this in Rocky Mountain National.
We talked about me and what I’m doing in England a little bit. It was obvious they thought I was some kind of undergraduate, until I told them otherwise. Even so, one of them asked, "What does your mother think about her daughter being out doing this sort of thing on her own?"
I tried gently to convince them that Mom’s had a lot of years to get used to it.
So comes the question, "How old are you?"
At which point I sweetly request to keep my own counsel and the other man reminds his friend that it’s not polite to ask ladies their ages. Damn right.
The fog lifted successively the lower we went. I got the cameras out again but they still weren’t much good-- misted up inside.
We took a shorter way down than the way I'd come up, and came out at the opposite side of the pine forest.They shared their coffee and tea biscuits with me back down at the carpark. I have long since decided that it’s rude to refuse such hospitality by insisting on touching nothing but tea, so I drank the coffee and thank you for it.
They yelled at me a little for being up there with no compass or matches and I suppose they were right. Somehow I can’t get all that worked up about a great bald-headed hill, but I could see from my map that if I’d gotten off on that other path it would’ve been a damn long way before I’d’ve found a road. (Still doesn’t scare me much, though-- I’d’ve noticed pretty quickly that the contours didn’t match those of my intended path on the map.)
Vernon gave me a lift back to my car and showed me the route to the M4 at Cardiff and then back to England. I bade him thanks and farewell, then sat there awhile resting and eating a meat pie I’d bought in Brecon and had intended to have at the summit. It was 4:30.
That done, I put my muddy shoe to the gas pedal and took off south down the A470, the interval wipers going most of the time. Though sometimes it really rained in earnest. Could’ve missed the entrance for the M4 because some jerk Welsh Nationalist had spraypainted over the sign, but I kept my eyes open and made it onto the eastbound anyway.
It felt very fine to go 70 mph (80!) again. (The Welsh gentlemen had said I looked like someone who’d do that on the motorway-- "She’s got that glint in her eye." Oh really?) This despite the rain . . .
Came across the Severn Bridge above Bristol at around 6:30. I knew I was back in England proper when the toll booth man greeted me with, "‘Ello, ducks!" Righty-oh, mate!
Joined the M5 at Almondsbury. Skirted Bristol which was a little too bad, as I really want to see the Clifton Suspension Bridge again.
The lady at the B&B had given me directions and they were decent ones-- hop off the M5 above Bridgwater and look for the A39 to Minehead. It was starting to get dark pretty quickly, with the rain and all, but I was now in Somerset and that was a happiness in itself.
Back to twisting, rolling, well-wooded English lanes here. Amused by a deer-crossing sign shot full of holes somewhere near Nether Stowey. Bad hunting, gentlemen? Cannington is a pretty town, as I noticed when I went through. And where have I heard of Nether Stowey before?
Holford’s about three miles west of there. The B&B, the Forge Cottage, is right smack at the edge of town, next to the 16th Century Plough Inn and across from the very 20th Century Texaco (raised petrol prices and all).
Mrs. Ayshford wasn’t in, being on duty as a cook at the pub. Mr. Ayshford let me in and showed me to my room. I’m not sure why, but that bothered me. Maybe it was his London accent. At any rate, I told myself not to be so sexist.
I requested an iron and ironing board and did up the shirts and skirts that’ve been crammed in clean but wrinkled since Iona. That over, I put on my radio headphones and vegetated, listening to BBC comedy shows.
I do believe I’m becoming acculturated. I can understand M25 jokes: "The M25 is the only motorway in Britain where the hedgehogs go faster than the cars. They thumb their noses at the drivers as they cross during rush hour." Then there was a program about "Britain’s only Communist football team," called Lenin and the Rovers. I just sat there listening, too tired to do anything but fall over in suppressed laughter.
Was treated to a cheap thrill during a trip to the loo around midnight. Mine host apparently had the same idea and came out of his room wearing nothing but a pair of black briefs. Very cheap, and not too thrilling under the beer belly. He saw me and popped back into his room like the proverbial rabbit. All very well, but I hope the Mrs. doesn’t work late every evening.
The room is adequate in size and has a sink. What it doesn’t have is a heater, of any kind. Nothing for it but to appropriate the duvet from the other bed as well . . .
Friday, 31 March, 1989
Caernarfon to Aberbran
Day Fifteen
Was up reading till around 2:00 last night and, not having the nerve to risk waking people up by going down the hall to the lavoratory, I went to bed with a dirty face. That’s one of the drawbacks of not having a sink in the room.
Yesterday Mrs. Hughes had asked if I’d like a grapefruit for breakfast. I’d said, yes, that would be nice . . . But I certainly wasn’t expecting her to go to the effort of sectioning one with mandarin orange pieces and a cherry. It was a nice touch.
Packed up my things and put them in the car, but left the car parked on Victoria Road, out front, while I visited the castle down the hill. Spoke to Mr. Hughes, or rather, Dr. Hughes, as I was leaving. Turns out he’s a retired Presbyterian minister. There’s something about being here that makes you realize just how strongly the roots of the American Presbyterian church grip the soil of Wales. In many of the hymns, if nothing else.
To the great castle of Caernarfon today, then. The day started out overcast but cleared up to the extent that I’m sure I took a lot of pictures twice, once in shade and once in light. Seeing the effect the sunshine could have on the stone, I kept feeling a kind of idiot surprise. You’d think I’d gotten so used to the light effects through cloud that I’d forgotten things could look any other way.
I probably lead my life like that. I’m so used to this narrow, dull range of mediocrity-- of accomplishment, of emotion, of spirit-- that I no longer remember that something brighter and stronger is definitely possible. I hope clearing away the obscuring clouds isn’t in my purview, however. I wouldn’t know the first way to go about it.
Edward I and his successors certainly built themselves one whopping big castle. I started out at the Granary Tower and gradually worked my way around counter-clockwise, exploring every chamber, stair, wallwalk, or other nook or cranny that was accessible. Saw a plethora of fireplaces fitted out with genuine, original Carnarfon arches (I wonder if those chimneys ever smoked?). And I wondered how all these towers had looked with their storeys properly floored, all those beam holes in the their walls fitted with beams, and a roof over all.
The Eagle tower is restored to that condition. But I think it’d be good (there are so many towers there) if at least once chamber was fitted and furnished as it would’ve been in the 14th Century, with painted plaster on the walls and everything.
There were a good number of other people going over the castle as well. (There was one school group, presided over by a matronly teacher with a very loud voice. She had no hesitation about using it to bring to general notice any minor infraction by one of her charges. If I’d been one of those kids I’d’ve died of embarrassment.) Still, when I saw a suspicious-looking man on his own in one of the passages on the south side, I took my time until he had moved away. Another episode as at Carcassonne I don’t need [There, in a tight place between the double walls the previous December, I was, shall we say, indecently accosted by a sleazy character. I broke free right away and ran for the main gate, but it made me a little sick to know that if he'd really wanted to pursue and catch me, he could have].
Saw everything there was to see till I got round to the Queen’s Gate, by which time I was very tired and said to hell with the rest of it. I don’t think God’s going to hold one tower and two stretches of wall against me.
Left the castle and went over to the pedestrian shopping street and bought a steak and kidney pie for lunch. I ate it sitting near a monument while I contemplated all the bilingual signs and wondered about Welsh grammar.
Got another pie and a macaroon for tonight, then returned to the castle to visit the shop. Was closed for inventory. Got my postcards at a shop (or siop) outside the castle walls.
And I called ahead to South Wales about tonight’s lodging. The place near Brecon named in Staying Off the Beaten Track was full, but they recommended me another place, where I booked a room.
Back up at the car, I marked my route and headed out by 2:30 or so. Took the Porthmadog road, the A487, south to where it joins with the A470 south of Ffestiniog. North Wales is definitely coal country [Wrong. Slate.], though I’m not totally sure if those subsided heaps of flat gray stones on the hill sides were of coal slag or were slates.
The day stayed fine, the landscape was beautiful, and I was one frustrated little kid at not being able to pull off anywhere to really look at it. In the North stone walls line all the roads, as in Scotland, and there was no place to squeeze off. Too bad, especially as there was a spectacular rainbow at one point.
I saw the funniest thing in the hills between Dolgellau and Machynlleth. As I came around a curve there was a person in the road, trying to flag me down. Thinking there had been an accident or something, I slowed to a stop, wondering if I’d be able to assist if required. The woman approached the car and said, "Some sheep are coming down the road. I’m taking them up that lane. We’ll be out of the way in a few minutes." She then dashed over to give the same message to the driver behind.
And in a moment here the sheep came, from around the bend ahead of me, appearing from behind the curve of the hill. They came not slowly and phlegmatically, as I’d expected, but trotting and gambolling like little dogs, seeming to grin as they advanced, even as puppies do. All seven or eight of them overshot the turn and came bounding up to their shepherdess (in wellies and oiled jacket) and she, in the Welsh version of the lingua franca used between sheep and shepherd, gave a command. At that, they all turned and scampered up the little lane and out of sight, with no other urging or coercion, followed closely by their keeper.
The traffic started up again. Even in my amusement, as I went on I couldn’t help but be reminded of what Jesus said about "I am the Good Shepherd of the sheep. My sheep know My voice and follow Me."
Sometimes as I drove I listened to Welsh radio, seeing if I could pick words out here and there. It sounds more graceful than it reads. And sometimes I turned the radio off and sang all the hymns to Welsh tunes I could remember: Hyfrydol, Cwm Rhondda, Aberystwyth, Ton-y-Botel, Llanfair . . . Rather frustrating to find that after this time away from the Presbyterian hymnal, I’m a little rusty on the words.
I did pretty well with keeping to my projected route. I only went wrong once, when I took the turnoff for Llanadarn before Aberystwyth. I turned around and rejoined the A487-- then found if I’d kept on I would’ve bypassed Aberystwyth and saved myself a few miles. But that’s all right, because if I had, I would’ve missed the view of Cardigan Bay shimmering silver in the afternoon sun.
The landscape becomes more pastoral, rounded, and homely the further south you go. Golden light bathed the valleys and hills, and highlighted the roadside hedges that now replaced the rubble stone walls. The yellow green hills were punctuated with sheep, grazing against the crisscross of the sloping fields.
I headed southeast at Aberaeron, on the A482, through Lampeter. I pulled off to check the map in Llandovery and found I was all right, I’d gotten onto the A40 as I should. It was past 7:00 by now but the light was holding beautifully.
I had an Ordnance Survey 1:50,000 map of the Brecon Beacons area with me and it was a good thing. The lady at the B&B had given me directions, but for some reason, probably habit, she’d given them as if I were coming from the east, not the west. But the hamlet where the farm is, Aberbran, is on the map and I hadn’t the least bit of trouble knowing when to look for the sign for the turnoff.
There was a black and white cat that ran across the lane as I approached. "Out of the way, moggie," said I. "I don’t want to hit you."
The actual name of the place is Aberbran-Fach, or little (farm) at the mouth of the black water, to distinguish it from Aberbran-Mawr up the lane before the bridge over the Usk. I pulled into the yard and was greeted by the usual brace of black and white shepherd dogs, and could hear the bleating and lowing of some of their charges across the court. Pretty soon the owner, Mrs. Jones (very Welsh) came out. Though definitely what I’d call pushing elderly, she insisted on carrying my bag in. Fortunately her husband carried it upstairs.
Basic good white and tile farmhouse with an Aga stove in the kitchen. They’d made some "improvements" by pasting weave-cloth photograph vinyl wall covering over the plaster between the antique timber beams. A little off, but for £11 you can’t have everything.
And Mrs. Jones was so kind and filled me full of tea and Welsh cakes down in the parlor. There was a fire going in the fireplace and it was good just to sit and rest.
The cakes look like little pancakes about 1½" across, but they’re thicker and are more of a shortening bread. "A lot of English people want to put butter on these," she announced in a tone that fully indicated the cultural ignorance of any who would even consider such a thing. As would not I, of course not. Besides, no butter had been present to tempt me to such a desire.
I hadn’t seen a newspaper in ages so I picked up one of the tabloids they had there. Well, I’d heard the Sun and the Star were sleazy rags and now I discovered it first hand. I suppose one simply pretends not to see the young ladies displaying their mammaries on Page 3 and turns on to the important news of the latest Hollywood or Royal scandal and the editor’s current sanctimonious posturing. It gets pretty thin, though.
There was another couple, from London, staying there too and around 9:00 they returned from a steak dinner in Brecon (dream on, kid). The TV was on but no one really watched it. Mr. Jones dozed in his chair and everyone else talked about Welsh.
They don’t really speak it in south Wales, Mrs. Jones informed us, though they can read it well enough. I’m starting to pick up some vocabulary and even some pronunciation. I find it is inflected from the front-- initial consonants can vary depending upon a word’s place in the sentence [Well, sort of. Not exactly inflected, but mutated.]
General adjournment of guests for upstairs at 10:00 or so. Me, I sat up and worked on the journal till after 2:00 . . . It was fun going to the loo around midnight. All the lights were off, it was pitch black in the passageway, and I dared not turn any lights back on. So I had to feel my way along, avoiding the narrow place at the top of the stairs, and feeling very shaky where the floor in the kitchen wing sloped perceptibly downwards towards the bathroom door. (The bathroom floor sloped severely, too.) Getting back was much easier, since I knew then what I was doing.
Ate the meat pie I bought in Carnarfon this afternoon, lest it go bad. Tried not to leave crumbs around. Less luck with the chocolate I followed it with. Got a bit on the white bedspread. Moistened my washcloth in the water from the carafe and did my best to get it out. Talk about klutzy.
Thursday, 30 March, 1989
Fitz to Shrewsbury to Caernarfon
Day Fourteen
Whole party assembled at breakfast in the main dining room in the morning, including Ted* and Susanna's* 17 month old baby, Timothy*. Intelligent child, even if not speaking intelligibly yet. The baby’s tone of voice and inflection made it sound as if he had something important to say, if only he could get his tongue around the syllables. Reminded me of the children at Coverdale*.
I thought about mentioning the mice, but refrained because I was only there the one night and Mr. and Mrs. Baly probably couldn’t do anything about it at the moment anyway.
After breakfast Harry* and Elspeth* and I adjourned to the sitting room to see a video on Shropshire the Balys had. It was a little boosteristic in places (I kept my mouth shut, though appallingly I was tempted to make cynical comments) but it did me the favor of showing me what Shrewsbury Abbey looks like.
Went upstairs thereafter and took a bath and all the rest of it, then packed up and was ready to go by 11:00.
I never know how it is with people. Last night Mrs. Baly was very kind and even motherly with me; this morning she was perfunctory and mainly concerned that I pay my £12.50 and let her get on with her business. I suppose that had something to do with it, since Fitz Manor is a working farm and they had had some Welsh sheep pastured on their land this winter, since Shropshire had grass while Wales (NE part) didn’t. And today the Welsh shepherd was come to collect his flock.
Still, my hostess’s change in manner had me wondering for much of the rest of the day what I could possibly have done or said. Maybe I’m oversensitive . . . but I’m afraid that if I blow that sort of thing off all the time, I’ll be in danger of being inconsiderate of someone I really have hurt. [I've recently learned something about the practice of overwintering the young mountain lambs on lowland farms and what a major undertaking it is to gather them all in to return them home. So yes, I was being oversensitive.]
Took off for Shrewsbury along the not-so-well sign-posted lanes. Arrived there from the north, driving in from the castle side and went round and round from awhile, trying to find a carpark. No luck, till I found myself on the Wyle Cop (familiar name, that), going eastward across the bridge over the Severn, and heading up the Abbey Foregate towards the red sandstone front of the formerly Benedictine abbey church of St. Peter and St. Paul. I haven’t read all those Brother Cadfael mysteries for nothing.
Located a free carpark south of the church, reflecting ruefully that this expanse of broken tarmac and its attendant fenced-in spare parts yards were once part of the abbey grounds and gardens. The Meole Brace, which still exists under a different name, was completely obscured among the jumble of decaying modern buildings. The millpond still exists as a stagnant pool next to some archeological diggings sponsored by the University of Birmingham, but looking long unworked.
The abbey church is a stout Norman building with a Gothic choir and narthex added at either end. Along the south side you can see the jagged masonry where the demolished abbey walls and buildings used to join its fabric.
The interior is of three storeys, with round piers with plain banded capitals supporting no-nonsense rounded arches at the nave arcade and triforium levels. Above that the clerestory is a mural surface pierced by round-headed windows.
As I passed through the nave, I constantly had to stop myself from saying things to myself like, "This is the part that Brother Cadfael knew." He is, after all, only an invention of the writer Ellis Peters. Still, it was helpful to think of his character as I walked through "his" church. Though sometimes perplexed by them, the sins and foibles of man do not shake his faith in God. Whatever evil man can do, Cadfael is assured that God can do greater good still, and he rests in the confidence that God can make right, here or beyond the grave, whatever messes we make of our lives and the lives of others. Only a fictional character, true, but when so many evil fictional characters are influencing people to the bad, why not rejoice in the fact that an author has seen fit to invent one who can confirm one in the good?
It was funny-- they had a supply of the Brother Cadfael novels for sale in the little postcard shop. I peeked in one or two just long enough to look at Peters’ sketch maps of the abbey and its environs to reconcile them with the 20th century cityscape outside. Actually, that’s why I stopped in Shrewsbury in the first place.
There’s a road running south of the church as well as to the north, now. It’s called the Abbey Foregate as well.
They had a little pamphlet there, locating the places around Shrewsbury that Peters features in her novels. But it cost 60p and that seemed a little steep for a mimeographed sheet that would only serve to satisfy a literary fancy.
Headed for the Severn, and walked a bit in a little garden that marks the approach to the Gaye. The Severn is a little river here, like most English rivers I’ve seen (when they aren’t estuaries).
The English Bridge as it stands is an 18th century production, reworked and widened in 1924.
Crossed it and walked up the Wyle to the main square and ye olde tourist information office. Needed to know where the local NatWest is so I could cash in some traveller’s cheques, and learn where I could find Butchers’ Row, to see the 15th century house I’d read of in Margaret Wood.
While I was there at the tourist office I, quite lazily, decided to make use of their "Book a room ahead" service. The man told me they’d find me a place in Carnarfon and would tell about it if I’d come back in a half hour. £1.50.
Found the NatWest, got the cash, and remembered to ask about the check I’d discovered missing the other day. The computer had a record of the amount-- £45--but none of the endorsee. I’d have to call Oxford for that.
So I went and found a phonecard booth and had the Cornmarket branch on the line, when it came to me that the check is one I wrote out of order before I left Oxford. So all is well.
Found Butchers’ Row. It has 15th century timbered and jettied houses at both ends, dragon beams and all.
Bought a cheese savory and a cream pastry at a baker’s shop and returned to the tourist office by 2:30 or so. They’d gotten me a place at a Mrs. Hughes’, in a house with a Greek name-- Pros Kairon-- and the man wrote out the directions for me.
Sat out in the square then and wrote the Mackintosh postcard to Jim* and Annie* [our brilliant furniture makers back in Kansas City]. Shrewsbury’s a pleasant town but could do with fewer agglomerations of foul-mouthed pre-teenaged boys. They’re on school holiday, too, and were hanging around the square trading insults and voicing threats of what they were going to do to some other gangs of boys, their chorus sometimes augmented by solos from one or two local drunks who found the square a convenient place to pass the time as well.
Posted the card, then went to the street leading to the Castle and stopped at Boots, for some vitamins. I’m out. And got some shampoo, as well.
Didn’t go into the castle keep (it’s a military museum now, which didn’t particularly interest me), but you can come into the walls and admire the garden and climb the tower all you wish.
The neck of land that falls between the two sides of the loop of the Severn in front of the castle is spanned now by the BritRail terminal and its platforms. It’s disappointingly, monumentally ugly.
Walked back to the carpark another way, more or less. Took note of the Norman south door on St. Mary’s. Then a little later, turned off the Wyle to follow the lane of St. Julian’s Friars. No remains of a friary to photograph, though, so I just walked along the Severn north to the English Bridge and back to the carpark.
Pulled out around 4:15. Back across the Severn, around the southern bypass (or what passes for one in this town), across the Welsh bridge and through Frankwell, and thence to the A5 and Llangollen.
Into Wales at Chirk. First thing you notice is that the Welsh are very serious about Welsh. I determined not to get into any accidents along these twisty roads-- I could never cope with an argument in such an unintelligible tongue.
But I had the fun of seeing the region for which so many Philadelphia suburbs are named. Passed by the turnoffs for both Bala and Cynwyd.
For one stretch I had the exquisite pleasure of forming part of a parade behind a very wide house trailer that was being moved. Police escort and all. They occasionally had to stop oncoming traffic so the trailer could go by.
After awhile the mist set in and it began to rain a little. Along the A4086, before the rail line for the top of Snowdon, I passed through a valley that was grand even in its grim bleakness. There was no vegetation to be seen, and great black rocks lay in tumbled heaps and spills along the mountain faces, below nightmarish crags. I said to myself, "Mordor. It's Mordor. This is where Tolkien got it for Lord of the Rings. It's Mordor!" And the mist made it seem bleaker-- and therefore more romantic-- still.
Into Carnarfon by 6:45, fifteen minutes ahead of schedule. Directions were fine-- to a point. Said take the second right after turning left at the firestation. Second right was a One Way Do Not Enter onto the motorway. Went back to the Shell Station near the firehouse, to ask directions.
Filled up the car while I was there, since the radio had said Texaco would be raising their petrol prices to £1.878, up by 7p a gallon, and I could just see Shell following suit.
Inside, everyone was speaking Welsh. Momentary fear: what if they’re so militant they’re not bilingual? But they were. I started to explain what my directions had said but the woman cut me off with a perfunctory "Listen!" which brooked no nonsense from idiot foreigners. In her opinion I was to turn left after the left by the fire station.
Tried that, and it ultimately worked, even if the street had no name plate, in Welsh or English, and I had to ask a passerby if I was in the right place.
All this is giving me an entirely new insight on Jonah 4:11. I used to think that bit about the people of Nineveh not knowing their right hands from their left was a metaphor for a kind of moral blindness. But now I see it simply means they couldn’t give accurate directions! It’s a good thing for them the way through the city was obvious, for if Jonah had had to rely on the directions of such people as around here, he’d’ve been preaching only in one small corner of the city those three days, not enough people would have repented, and Nineveh would’ve been destroyed.
Found "Pros Kairon" by parking the car and walking down and then up the street till I spotted a B&B sign. Mrs. Hughes, a little elderly Welshwoman, was ready to answer my ring; she said she’d been looking out for me.
Room was upstairs at the back, overlooking a bit of garden. Small, but nice, with an electric blanket on the bed and a space heater.
Since it was relatively early, I decided to be reckless with my cash and get a pub meal in the town center. The Hugheses directed me to a pub they recommend and I set off.
They live in a part of Carnarfon outside the Edwardian [Edward I--13th century] walls. The houses here are all pretty modern: Victorian or newer than that, marching in mostly-gray ranks up and down the hills.
To get to the town center you have to go down the hill, across the motorway via a pedestrian underpass, along a street or two, and then you’re in the castle square. The city still focusses there, it seems.
The castle, which I cannot do better than describe as a formidible pile (though Carcassonne on its hill is more aesthetically impressive), lies at the point where the River Seiont empties into the Menai Strait. The boats moored in the river mouth looked, in the mist-filled drizzly twilight, as if they were sitting on a water preternaturally calm.
There were many people about, even though not a lot of places seemed to be open. Everyone was speaking Welsh and most of the signs were in that language, or that and English both. I am beginning to pick out words here and there, written, but have no idea how the grammar works.
The directions I’d received at the B&B didn’t work too effectively, for lack of street signs. I finally found the pub, The Black Boy (and was it a racist act to go there?) via the offices of another pub, who weren’t serving evening meals but were happy to direct me to one that was-- the aforementioned B. B.
Ordered a plate of garlic mussels and sat down at a table to wait for them. The TV was on, showing some BBC evening soap opera, which soon ended. Then a program about some British man’s travels in Arizona came on. And I confess that the sight of all those cars driving on the righthand side made me a little queasy.
Pretty soon, the set was turned off and the juke box came on. It was highly incongruous, hearing the pounding background of those English rock songs laid beneath the general flow of Welsh conversation. You’d think they’d have some Welsh pop bands by now. Even funnier was when a Welsh tune did come on-- it was obviously meant to be some heart-stirring romantic or nationalistic ballad, and was sung dramatically by the Welsh version of Lawrence Welk’s inevitable Irish tenor-- and amongst the Welsh in the pub you could hear the very English expression from the brave young men of Wales: "Squelch it! Squelch it!!"
Some people don’t got no culcha.
One of the guys at the next table asked me, in English, what I was reading. At first my impulse was to give him the cold shoulder-- as in "I don’t talk to strangers"-- but decided not to be such a jerk. So we had a mild amount of chitchat, until he was called to join a darts match with some of his mates. The reason I felt odd about it is not that here I was an American in a Welsh pub, but that here I am 34 and surely he took me for someone closer to his age (mid-20s), or he wouldn’t have spoken to me . . . But why should I assume that? Maybe because I’m that way myself. Anyway, I felt odd, as if I were sailing under false colors.
The mussels were good, though they could’ve used a bit more salt. I had a half pint of Worthington’s bitter to go with them. Not the best combination, but the ale itself was palatable and not bitter to the extent of Guinness dark, say.
Satiated my chocolate craving with a bar bought at an off-license on the way back to the B&B. Went back without loitering or rubbernecking, because although it was hardly 9:00 PM, with the mist the streets were a little surreal.
Pros Kairon has a guest sitting room downstairs so I brought my journal down there to sit in front of the nice electric fire and work on it. But instead I talked to the other guests and let myself be distracted by the television. The others were a couple from Australia. They’d already been to Israel and Egypt before coming to England, and were labelling their photographs. We told trip stories, not neglecting ones about driving around the UK (especially in those winds last week), until they retired about 10:00.
I followed shortly, to work on the journal a little more but more to read Walter Scott.
