Northern Wales

This weekend G and I headed off to Northern Wales.  We had a really great couple of days meandering around the area.  Northern Wales is really pretty- there is a national park with beautiful mountains that is only 30 minutes away from the beach and a lot of small towns with grazing sheep in between. 

The beach in Llandudno.  Our B&B was only a block away from the beach.

Swallow Falls in Snowdonia National Park

Snowdonia National Park 

This tree is one of the oldest living things on earth.  It’s estimated to be over 4,000 years old!

All the signs were in both English and Welsh.

This is the island where Prince William currently lives.  

The castle in Bangor.

This is Caernarfon Castle, it is one of the most famous of the Walsh castles and where Prince Charles was invested as the Prince of Wales.  

The nimble little fella.

This town has the longest name in Europe: Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch.  It literally means “The church of mary in the hollow of the white hazel near the fierce whirlpool and the church of the red cave." Of course the locals abbreviate it. 

A name so long you can’t even keep the whole thing in focus! 

This bridge cracked me up.  It says, “This arch was constructed in the same year the Battle of Waterloo was fought." Of all the random things…

According to the Welsh legends, these ruins were the final known location of the Holy Grail. 

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A horsey in Horsey

Last week G and I were in Norwich, England to do some training classes for G’s work.  We spent the weekend meandering around the area and right outside of Horsey, England we saw this beautiful guy.    

This is him running over to us.

Maybe he knew we had apples!

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Check out Windsor Castle!

Located just outside of London is Windsor Castle- the Queen’s favorite home and the oldest and largest occupied castle in the world.  

Our tour guide told us that Windsor was never damaged during the WWII bombings because this was where Hitler wanted to live if the Nazis had conquered the UK.  It was also where the King and his family lived during WWII, and why people speculate that it is Queen Elizabeth’s favorite home because she spent so much of her childhood there.  

Our tourguide

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Warwick Castle

Before Dad left to go back to the States he spent a little time with us in Leamington.  Unfortunately, it rained 90% of the time that he was here, so we did a lot of what we Beckenhauers do best: watch movies.  

But, shock of all shocks, we woke up one day to blue skies and sunshine, so we headed over to Warwick, the town right next to ours. Warwick has a pretty cool castle to explore. Here’s a glance at it:

So here’s a few interesting facts about the castle.  

- It was first established in the early 11th century, but it wasn’t until the 13th century, when it was rebuilt that the castle became a place of prominence

- One of the owners of this castle helped supervise Joan of Arc’s trial and execution

- Throughout the years it was been visited by Queen Elizabeth I, Queen Victoria, Winston Churchill, and Queen Elizabeth II. (though the latter came after it was turned into a museum)

- It was actually occupied and privately owned until 1978, when it was sold and turned into a museum. 

 

The guys had to learn the hard way not to cross me.

In case you’re wondering, this is THE sword in the stone.

I tried really hard to get it out.

But the darn thing wouldn’t budge.  So I called in for reinforcements…

Luckily my husband is an engineer. He decided to just take the whole rock and get the stone out later.  What will we tell the landlords?

A view of Warwick from the walls.

The best part about the castle?  You get to try on all the stuff.

And play with the swords! (A coward’s weapon, we later learned from a local serf)

We decided to skip the torture chamber dungeons though.  Something about no guarantee of keeping your head…yikes!

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