How well can you really get to know a country and its people in a short week? But it was a week of investigation, fueled as ever by curiosity. Back home I don't believe I have any Welsh friends in my inner circle. We are fed so many stereotypes about the Irish, the Scots, but little on the Welsh. So I sought the history and culture of the country, not so as to generalize, but more in the spirit of wondering how it differs from that of the English.
We begin at the rainy castle at Caerphilly, with its attractively wonky tower. Restoration prevents us from entering the grand ballroom, which fuels a rant about the whole world seemingly under renovation, spurred on, and funded by, the lucre of overtourism. The comfy pub lunch, subsequently walked off within the confines of the St. Fagans National Museum of History. I'm most intrigued by the row of Welsh cottages, each one set up in period decor of varying ages. Moving left to right brings you into the present. Smoke drifts above thatch farmhouses here and there, moving up through the grey sky overhead. The fires are fed by friendly but talkative attendants, who linger in dark corners. They startle me more than once. The old church that wasn't an old church but rather the Royal Court which the Princes of Gwynedd used during the 13th century.
Cardiff in the rain. Wet and dry wander through the city's Victorian arcades. Beautiful shops, loads of colored glass, London culture brought over to appease the wives of the mine owners. Then a respite from the weather with a brief look at the market. The following morning dawns blue, and we stand in the sunshine, waiting for the castle to open. A tall South African and his son are the only others in the queue, in town for the rugby. This explains the unfamiliar language we heard over breakfast at the hotel -- Afrikaans. The castle is the usual handsome tower of bricks, which charms, but I am more drawn to the WWII era tunnels that ring the perimeter. I move through them quickly, under the low lights and the recorded din of the war, which bring clarity due to having recently watched a number of war films, in order to get a better sense of history. (Unlike when I first watched many of these same films when was a boy, I now tend to glaze over the battle scenes themselves.).
The weather holds as we move down the shore to Mumbles, with all the feel of a middle class British beach resort. It's timelessness is a far-cry from a self-conciously hipper Brighton of a week before.
In Swansea, I quickly beeline to the Dylan Thomas centre, where another friendly but talkative docent gives me a rough idea of Thomas-related sights to visit. Two of these are bars. I feel a bit vibed-out at The Queen's Hotel, still patronized by those more at home standing upon the decks of a thousand cinematic ships. I am more at ease in a more cozy No Name Bar, but would rather be there with a companion, for long drinks and attendant conversation. I nurse my pint before the fire, dipping into my vintage New Directions volume of Dylan's verse, but more amused by the animated liquiform conversations of Swansea's living residents. I later regroup with Lai Yong back at our digs at Morgan's Hotel, for dinner at the harbor, passing as we go more of Thomas' characters, though these made of bronze. And we look for more during a ramble through the quiet sunny Sunday Swansea streets, playing connect the dots with sites relevant to his history, or those left after the fall of Nazi bombs. It still feels a bit run down and abandoned, but for the charm of aging monuments. (And charm is what I personally found lacking in a smarter, but somehow rougher looking, Cardiff.) The last stop must of course be Thomas's birthplace, now run as a B&B, though only those willing to do multiple-night stays. Two people are in deep, intimate conversation out front. I take photos conspicuously, hoping to blag my way in for a quick look. When the talking ceases, they both wander off, unaffiliated with the place. Nothing left to do but hit the road, and move toward Thomas' grave, an hour's drive away.
We detour broadly first, first for a ramble out the broad watershed of Three Cliffs Bay, beneath the dilapidated Penard castle on the hillside, where silhouettes take turns filling the ruined windows. Large backpacks betray the figures of long-distance walkers moving along the Wales Coast Path, backlit by the sun as if on the cover of a hiking guidebook. We arrive at a row of large stones that serve as a foot crossing of the broad brook, traversed by families, and completely ignored by their dogs who instead splash across.
The higher cliffs of Rhossili are an absolute highlight for me, like a mini Seven Sisters, but scoring bonus points due to the long beach running below, and Worm's Head rising like punctuation just offshore. A return visit is in order, to stay a few days, wandering the hills and the beaches. Thomas had been here too, of course, stranded overnight on some rocks when he misjudged the tides. I in turn find the world's best reading spot, nested into the smoothed rocks, a paradise with some tea and the view and a book.
We move across the Gower, bypassing the monoliths of King Arthur's seat, which I later regretfully find are closer to the road that I'd thought. We do sneak in another quick visit with a King Arthur theme, Kidwelly Castle, film location for the Python's Holy Grail. But momentum and my mind sped us onward toward Laugharne. There is a little bit of a jiggle to get into Thomas' favorite pub, Brown's; it is Sunday, the roasts are done, and the cook wants to go home. I blag my usual blag -- travel writer on assignment, blah blah, blah -- which at least gets us a pint and some old but tasty chips. We follow with a wander down to the waterline, then over for a quick visit to Thomas' Boathouse and his writer's shed, lengthened only by another friendly but chatty caretaker. Thomas's grave was far quieter, the churchyard empty, leaving me alone to admire the views as the hills sloped down to the river valley below.
We overnight in Tenby. Our late afternoon stroll takes us through a much livelier beach town than Mumbles had been, with its busy little lanes, houses of multi-colored frontages, and steps descending toward boats stranded at low tide. I am sorely tempted by the craft beer place yet resist, as St. Catherine's Island is about to get cut off by the rising tide. We climb up to the old prison there, which has a profound feel of The Man in the Iron Mask; little surprise since it had been filmed there. But even the most talented set designers couldn't possibly add to the forlorn nature of the place. The cold and the damp must have been truly awful to its guests.
Morning brings a different saint, Saint Davids with its cathedral and ruins. We are beginning to weary of ruined castles, for, as with Japanese castles, their appeal is with their outer architectural aesthetics rather than in meandering stone corridors leading to yet another featureless chamber. (This is true too of the massive and gorgeous Pembroke Castle along the way.) We move onward though the incredibly narrow country roads lined with hedgerows, praying to not meet oncoming traffic. This shortcut bypasses Fishguard, a mirthful name that later turns sour when I discover it was the filming location for Under Milkwood.
Eleven bikers fill the pub in Rosebush where we hope to have lunch, so we decide to do our hike up Foel Cwmcerwyn, the highest point of the Preseli Hills. The monoliths of Stonehenge come from here, mysteriously moved far away to England's Salisbury Plain, which the most intriguing theory suggests were carried along by glaciers. Our climb takes us up through what could be a Christmas tree farm, passing families with multiple children descending low grey clouds brought on by a strengthening wind. Luckily the rains never come, but we seem to get this same weather anytime we attempt a country ramble. Later reading mentions two other nearby spots where the stones actually originated, one a much shorter hike away. In hindsight, this would have been a far better choice as our own hike takes much longer than the 90 minute map time. We race to make it back to pub before the service stops and we face yet another lunch of old chips. And much like yesterday, I feel the need for a return visit.
Photographs of Castell Carreg Cennen show the castle to spread majestically above the rolling Welsh landscape, but the weather is truly gloomy, and the shutter closes in. We hurry on then to our base for the next couple of days. About 30 years ago, I first read about Hay-on-Wye, and ever since, whenever I heard mention of Wales, this town of books was the first place to which my mind traveled. I am finally able to make the pilgrimage. The gardens of The Swan, where we stay, make a perfect perch with a beer and book. Were I to stay again I'd stay at The Black Lion, due to its history and terrific menu. After lunch there, we passed the rest of the day popping in and out of book shops. I could easily spend thousands and thousand of dollars here, so like the man who turns away from a banquet in order to maintain his diet, I pick up only a few titles. Because where would it stop, really? I feel the need for a longer visit sometime, a week perhaps, in order to poke around the shops longer and to explore the area. Armed with a very large budget.
One greatly anticipated highlight for this trip would be the ramble up Pen-y-Fan. Dawn is magical and blue, but the mountain's top is all socked in. I was heartbroken when I later saw the views in photos online. Due to the deteriorating weather, Lai Yong turned back, so I am proud of myself that I cut a full hour off a three hour hike, in order that she wasn't kept waiting long.
The final drive, castle hopping down the Wye. The first stop is at the medieval stone bridge at Crickhowell, followed by coffee at the former courthouse. A friendly local walking his dog explains some of the town's history to me. More brief stops at Abergaverny's St. Mary's Priory, a mini Westminster Abbey with its marble grave markers covering the entire floor. We get White Castle to ourselves, and we wander its single circular chamber, my mind never far from the burger chain of the same name. Raglan is large and atmospheric and busy. I'd earlier seen a photo of it standing gloriously above its river valley, but am unable to find where the photo was taken, far from the crowds and the carpark. Monmouth has another stone bridge, Monnow, fortified by a simple yet graceful arch tower above. And the final castle, Chepstow, a sentinel overhanging the Wye, the first line of defense against those ever-encroaching English.
Then there was Tintern. Upon first glance, I feel as if all the other castles we'd seen up to then had simply been warm-ups for this. The Abbey and the lovely valley that surrounds it is a picturebook idyll, akin to something from Switzerland, from Bhutan. Once inside, the similes lean toward the ruins of Southeast Asia--Ayuthaya, the lessor temples of Ankor Wat. I relish a return, to overnight in the hotel above, the grounds beyond the edges of my feet.
What of the impressions then? The landscape rolls in a way that England's doesn't, broken up by the right angles of hedgerows. The sheer number of castles hint at a warrior people, but these were to
mainly to keep the English out, most built by the Normans in a
remarkably short time following the conquest. Old William was shred in
offering land grabs, and his barons (or rather their men), did all the
heavy lifting. It took the English kings two centuries to take control of the region. In modern times, parking proves to be the headache. Public car parks are like a grown-up example of what happens to children never could color within the lines. Paid lots were worse, each with its own unique payment system, universal only in their being counterintuitive and a waste of a good ten minutes in figuring them out. (On one occasion we left a garage unsure whether our card had been received, so I stopped the car along the road just outside and I ran back in the rain to find that it hadn't. The fee property paid then, only to receive a month later a ticket for illegally parking alongside the road. For all of three minutes, with my wife actually in the car.). Overall, Wales felt more like a ruralized, poorer version of England itself. The two main cities had a slight twinge of danger about them. And the cliche'd rolling accent not as unintelligible as expected, except in the case of restaurant waitstaff.
Again, I recognize these are immature, uninformed sentiments. But I certainly came away with a greater familiarity of the country. Reading Chatwin's Under the Black Hill, and watching the film adaptation, was like viewing a slideshow of the trip: Crickhowell bridge, the Brecon Beacons, Hay as film locations. The beauty once again came through. And 'return visit' continues to be the mantra. Plus, the entire North awaits...
On the turntable: Super Furry Animals, "Mwng"
