Friday, 25 October - Saturday, 26 October 2019
Friday, 25 October 2019
We booked tickets to ride a train up Mount Snowdon a few days ago. Mount Snowdon is the tallest peak in Wales and England topping out at 3,560 feet. Not too high in our standards, but worth going up. I wanted to hike up it which would have taken 6-8 hours round-trip, but Tim hasn't been feeling well, so I book train tickets. Here is the train:
Notice the wonderful blue skies and the view? Well...we didn't have any of that. When we woke up it was pouring. When we arrived at the train station at 9:30 AM, it was raining. When we headed up the mountain at 5 mph for 1 hour, it was raining with low visibility. Here we are standing on the peak with a 360 degree view of nothing. It was pouring and pretty cold at the top.
We spent 30 minutes on the summit and then go back on the train for the 1 hour trip back down. Here is a photo of our typical view out the train window:
The plan was to do a hike after the train ride, but the rain continued, so we went to the National Slate Museum instead. This was the museum we were supposed to go to a couple of days ago but wound up at Llechwedd Slate Caverns where we toured the mine. It winds up that taking that tour made us better appreciate the Slate Museum. By the way, the Slate Museum was an actual slate quarry mine called Dinorwig Quarry until 1969.
One of the museum highlights was a demonstration of slate splitting. This gentleman worked at this slate mine for most of his life. He demonstrated splitting a larger piece of slate into individual roofing slates. It is pretty cool that he still gets to show off his craft and make others better appreciate what these individuals did for a living.
One of the museum highlights was a demonstration of slate splitting. This gentleman worked at this slate mine for most of his life. He demonstrated splitting a larger piece of slate into individual roofing slates. It is pretty cool that he still gets to show off his craft and make others better appreciate what these individuals did for a living.
Another really cool part of the museum was a working water wheel. Inside some of the facilities, the gears were turning on the ceiling that used to run the equipment on the floor. Wow.
This quarry even had its own foundry where they made all the metal gears and equipment they needed.
Here is a great view of the museum and part of the quarry they used to mine slate from.
We then returned to Caernarfon. Tim was hungry, but most restaurants were closed until 5 PM, so he settled on KFC. After watching him eat, we went for a pint while waiting for the Indian restaurant to open. After the pint, I got some take-away Indian food and we returned to the hotel. Oh...I had to take another photo of the cool Caernarfon Castle.
The plan for tomorrow is to do a hike or two, but the weather isn't supposed to improve, so we will see how it goes.
Saturday, 26 October 2019
We woke up and it was still raining. The weather report said that it should clear up in the afternoon, so we decided to take it easy until then. We went down to breakfast and returned to the room. It is actually good to have this down time since I need to work on the rest of our Wales itinerary. As of now, I don't have any housing booked past tomorrow night, our last night in this hotel.
After a couple of hours I had a rough plan and 2 more places booked to get us through Tuesday morning. The rain has finally stopped, but I can't convince Tim that we should go on a hike. He is still not 100% and he fears that the trails will be wet and muddy from the 2 days of rain. I do agree with him about the muddy trails, but we had to get out of the hotel room, so I search for something to do, and a brewery popped up that was a 15 minute drive away.
So, off we went to Snowdonia Brewery. They only had 3 beers on tap, so I ordered a pint of each instead of the smaller sampler size.
After a couple of hours I had a rough plan and 2 more places booked to get us through Tuesday morning. The rain has finally stopped, but I can't convince Tim that we should go on a hike. He is still not 100% and he fears that the trails will be wet and muddy from the 2 days of rain. I do agree with him about the muddy trails, but we had to get out of the hotel room, so I search for something to do, and a brewery popped up that was a 15 minute drive away.
So, off we went to Snowdonia Brewery. They only had 3 beers on tap, so I ordered a pint of each instead of the smaller sampler size.
Snowdonia Brewery, Caernarfon, Wales, 26 October 2019
After the brewery we headed back to the hotel, parked the car, and walked to a local pub for a pint. The pub was filled with screaming children, so we finished the pint and went to the local Weatherspoon. We went to one of these a week ago and the food was OK, but the drink prices are amazing. It was a Saturday night, so it was pretty busy. We found a table for 2 and hung out there for a couple of hours eating a bit and drinking a bit. It was a fun night talking to others at the table next to ours.
On the drink menu they offered pitchers of mixed drinks for £6 each, so we thought we would try it. Tim had The Godfather (Jack Daniels, Amaretto, and Coke) and I had the Ginberry Fizz (Gin, Chambord Black Raspberry Liqueur, and Lemonade). YUM!
On the drink menu they offered pitchers of mixed drinks for £6 each, so we thought we would try it. Tim had The Godfather (Jack Daniels, Amaretto, and Coke) and I had the Ginberry Fizz (Gin, Chambord Black Raspberry Liqueur, and Lemonade). YUM!
We returned to the hotel around 8:30 PM, watched some TV and went to bed. Tomorrow we drive to Aberystwyth. It is only 2.5 hours away, so it shouldn't be too bad.
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