Here we go again, and the answer to the question posed at the end of the NC500 is:

…Whales!!!!

…no wait, I meant …. Wails!!!

…. OK, it must be WALES.

That’s why people keep coming back – where else would you get a homonym joke?

So, since the NC500 it’s been a bit pf a patchy time.  My back has been bad since I had to drive a tiny clown car to Kidlington and back.  In February, my brain decided to go down the black hole formed by my SAD (Seasonal Affected Disorder).  I ended up sat at home hardly moving for several weeks, which had the result of making my back even worse.  As a result, I had serious concerns about actually going on this holiday.  However, I thought about how disappointed my loyal fan would be, so I girded my loins and went ahead with the preparations.

Rather than the somewhat rushed 7 days for the NC500, this journey was a more leisurely 11 day trip around approximately 550 miles of Welsh roads.  (Admittedly, some of this was more Welsh-adjacent than actually in Wales.)  I decided to go around the coast as much as possible from Cardiff to Chester, and then head south through Shrewsbury, Hay-on-Wye and back to Cardiff.

As I did with Scotland and Scottish things, I have a list of Welsh things to try and see:

• Bara Brith
• A Red Dragon
• Leeks
• Daffodils
• Miners complaining about the English
• Somewhere that I have no chance of pronouncing the name
• A male voice choir
• Welsh Cakes
• Cawl
• Glamorgan Sausage
• Welsh Rarebit
• A woman in traditional Welsh costume with the silly hat
• Laver Bread
• Someone called Bronwyn or Blodwyn
• Someone called Ivor or Idris
• Curry “half ‘n’ half”

I am massively confident that I won’t get most of these.  But I have some help this year: Hamish the Highland Coo.  (Granted, he is often more of a hindrance than a help, but I live in hope).

Having deliberately got a couple of days off prior to setting out, I pack at 06:00 on the day of departure.  This year the usual small wheely bag has been replaced with a much larger, but more battered suitcase, which leans alarmingly when at rest because one of the legs on the bottom has fallen off.  However, that combined with the rucksack means that I have considerably more room than previously – and as I plan to finish with a trip to the second hand bookshops in Hay-on-Wye, I may well need it!  As usual, the Age Appropriate Hoodie and Baseball Cap are packed as well as an array of drugs and pills and some probably pointless sun cream.  To avoid the problem I had last year, I have purchased a waterproof camera bag which fits tightly in the rucksack.  Hamish gets strapped to the outside of the rucksack – and the grumbling starts almost immediately.  Despite that, we are ready to go.  This year I have remembered the guide books and the map.

I booked a taxi because I’m very nervous about how much my back is going to be able to cope with, and I feel it’s best to leave it as long as possible before I start walking around.  I head down and just as I step outside, it begins to rain.  Ah, weather, how you hate me!  The taxi driver is bang on time and has no issues with the short journey.  As a result, I give him a decent tip before getting out at that peerless palace of previous peregrinations, Slough Rail Station. 

It’s still a hole.

Today’s train journey is a quick nip to Reading and then a connecting train to Cardiff.  I’ve managed to arrive early, so I slip onto an earlier train – which is just as well, as my scheduled train is delayed and I would have missed my connection (probably!)

Reading Station still remains the heavenly haven that has been described in previous posts, so I won’t go over it again here.  Suffice it to say, it is also a hole.  I have about 40 minutes to wait for my train, so I grab some breakfast and settle down on Platform 9 to wait.  The rain is hammering down and it is bloody freezing, so the Age Appropriate Hoodie gets its’ first outing of the holiday.

My book is The Book of Souls by James Oswald.  This is the second in the Inspector McLean series.  I read the first one (Natural Causes) a couple of months ago and loved it.  They are police procedurals but with a decidedly supernatural edge to them.  I’m really looking forward to this one.

About 38 minutes later, they change the platform that the train is coming in at.  They don’t do anything as useful as announcing it, but I notice the people who have been standing around wandering over to another platform.  I realise what’s going on and drift along with them, arriving just in time for the train to pull in.

I have a reserved seat in a carriage full of serious people working on their laptops.  The only oddity is a couple of Oriental chaps who keep trying to video the world going by.  I find one of them standing by the loo, filming out of the train door.  I’m glad there is no way to open the window, or I suspect he would be leaning out.  (What is the fascination with filming the blurry world going by?  I’ve seen this once before, where again it was someone Oriental who was doing exactly the same thing.  Naturally, I didn’t do anything so sensible as to ask what they were hoping to capture on their phones.)

Before getting too involved with my book, I trawl through my Rough Guide to Wales to try and plan what to do once I get to Cardiff.  I won’t have more than a couple of hours there, so my choices seem to be the castle or the Millennium Centre.  Castles aren’t exactly in short supply in Wales, so I decide to head for the docklands and the Millennium Centre.  (I admit, this decision is largely made due to Doctor Who and Torchwood.)

The train heads west and stops at some really lovely places: Swindon, Bristol.  Not exactly an inspiring start to the holiday.  As the train leaves Brizzle, the sun forces its’ way through the clouds and the rain takes a break – possibly, it’s some kind of statutory lunch break.

I arrive in Cardiff in sunshine and disembark to get a taxi to Hertz Car Rentals.  The taxi rank here is one of the smallest I have seen, with taxis forced to come in and out via a road that is barely wide enough for two vehicles.  The driver has to carefully and slowly work his way out – which probably adds a couple of quid to the fare.  We head off through mostly residential streets – so residential, in fact, that I furtively check Google Maps to make sure we’re going the right way – which we are.  The Hertz office is tiny and I have to negotiate a substantial puddle to get in.  Inside, the staff member is extremely helpful, succeeds in selling me the Insurance package (he didn’t have to try very hard) and is suitably impressed with my planned route.

Outside, he introduces me to my noble steed – a Kia Ceed. 

He shows me round it and asks if I want the engine to turn off automatically.  I don’t.  I then ask if it has the annoying “lane discipline” feature.  It does and so he shows me how to turn both of them off – something which I will have to do every damn time I turn the engine on.  The luggage and grumpy coo are stowed away and we’re off!

Almost immediately, the car and I start to have disagreements.  It would appear that Cardiff is a 20mph zone throughout and the car has a “helpful feature” where it pings at me every time I go over the speed limit – which is remarkably easy to do.  At the first set of traffic lights, I find that I have forgotten to turn the auto ignition off.  The engine is so quiet that I don’t realise this until the lights change and I try to pull away – and sod all happens.  I try everything I can think of to get it to move and, to the understandable frustration of the people behind me, I miss the lights.  I have to turn the ignition off and on again.  I do so, turn the stupid function off and head off without further incident …. for now.

I head down to the Millennium Centre and begin the negotiation of a multi-storey car park.  At this point I find out how tricky it is to find the bite point as I’m ascending the ramps, so I either stall or over-rev alarmingly.  Stalling is bad, as then have to try and do a hill-start with this stupid bloody electronic hand-brake.  By the time I find a parking space, I’m starting to understand why a colleague claims she has PTSD about multi-storey car parks.

I head out to the Millennium Centre and Roald Dahl Plass. 

My back is aching, which is an excellent excuse for lunch at a café.  I am the only customer and order a cappuccino and a jacket potato while admiring the effort someone has put into their cocktails menu.

Suitably refreshed, I have a good wander around the harbour, taking in the Millenium Centre, the harbour itself, the Senedd (parliament) and (somewhat bizarrely) Ianto’s Shrine.  There is a plaque and everything – all for a fictional character.  Coincidentally, I read something about this a few weeks ago, where Gareth David-Lloyd said how touched he was that people still kept it going. (I should point out that since I visited, the local council have taken it down, although the plaque still remains). 

I carry on exploring and find some decent art, including a rendition of Cargoes by John Masefield and a statue to Welsh rugby heroes (though I raise an eyebrow at the comment about the team being multi-cultural).

By now, my back is screaming, so I work my way back to the car.  Back in the vehicle, I try to set the radio and get nothing.  I play with the volume – still nothing.  It’s only when I drive out of the multi-storey car park that it bursts into life, almost making me crash – the car park must have been blocking the signal.

I’m not someone who disagrees with cars providing assistance to drivers.  But trying to get to grips with them is frustrating and the quirks of the Kia Ceed start driving me nuts.  Every time I stop it goes into Auto Hold and it then won’t let me move.  Each time I end up having to turn the engine on and off again, and piss off more motorists behind me.  Also, the electric ignition takes significantly longer to turn on than just turning a key.  It also chimes every time something happens that it wants me to know about, and in town that means it seems to just chime constantly.  Each time it does, I have to try and work out why it’s chirping, which means I’m spending way to much time staring at the dashboard.  It’s a bit like this:

* Ping – change of speed limit
* Ping – you’re slightly over the speed limit
* Ping – you need to turn here
* Ping – change of speed limit
* Ping – I think you should change gears
* Ping – I think you’re exceeding the speed limit, but I’m actually wrong
* Ping – I haven’t pinged for a whole, so I thought I’d check you were awake

After a while, I find myself spending nearly all my time trying to work out why the car is pinging and I end up channelling my inner David Mitchel and yelling “WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?!?!?!?”  At the same time, I lose focus on the road, turn into a convent and drive maniacally through the gardens, scattering nuns everywhere like confetti.  OK, that didn’t actually happen – but it MIGHT have.

I head for Neath and after a short battle with the Navigation system, I get it to give me some directions.  I normally try and avoid motorways, but getting onto the M4 is a relief and the bloody pinging stops.  All is well until I pull off the M4 and get into a queue at some traffic lights.  Once again, Auto Hold goes on and the car stops responding.  There is a certain amount of swearing – which I’m sure is true for the cars behind me as well.  I manage to work out how to turn this “feature” off and the rest of the journey is uneventful.

I have some time when I get to Neath, so I head up to the Aberdulais falls.  This is an old tin mine that is a National Trust centre.  It is also closed as it only opens on Thursdays and Fridays.  Wales is not up to the most auspicious start, but at least it’s not raining and I have managed to avoid getting soaked in a stream.  I get some photos, sit in the car for a while and then head to my overnight at Cilffriw Farm.

It’s accessed by an exciting little track, which is a veritable highway compared to the even smaller track that is the final approach to the farm.  I park up and a lady who seems to have only two teeth directs me to the best place to park.  (If she only had one tooth, I would be seriously worried and be keeping an eye out for another woman with only one eye).  I get the car most of the way in and then it stalls and refuses to start again, so we agree to abandon it.

She spends about 45 minutes showing me around, explaining the defecatory habits of one of the dogs and showing me the ducks and the chickens.  It’s a good-sized farmhouse that has been converted for guests.  It’s very quiet here – animals, running water and not much else.  I love it.

I planned to pop down to the village to the fish and chip shop, but I’m knackered and I decide to make do with coffee and relaxation.  There is a brief debate with Hamish who tries to convince me that I should sleep on the sofa, but I’m having none of it.