Sunday and Monday

9 &10 April - St. Fagans

In Europe dates are traditionally written with the day of the month before the name or number of the month.  For example, the date 10/4/06 would be read in the US as October 4th while in England it would be understood as April 10th or more correctly as 10th April.  This doesn't have much effect on our daily lives, but lately we've been asked to sign and initial myriad documents all of which need to be dated in a manner acceptable to the locals.  It's harder than it looks. Bruce and Pam subscribed to the National Trust before they left the US.  This allows them to enter a whole lot of houses, gardens, and areas of interest for free, including parking.  I'm beginning to believe that the British economy is based on parking fees.  Sunday B&P (Bruce and Pam) headed off to several National Trust sites south of Bath and J&N (Jerry and Nancy) stayed home.  Had J&N gone along and paid normal admission prices it could have cost as much as £30 each (~ $54 each).  Having J&N stay home was very much like throwing B'rer Rabbit into the briar patch.  I had been getting increasingly concerned about updating our website and Bruce's computer seemed to be our only connection to the Internet.  With Bruce driving and looking at gardens, he wouldn't need his computer - so I borrowed it.   I ambled down to the library to find that Bruce had either conned me or he was a whole lot luckier getting online.  I spent several hours and was able to download only one page onto our website.  The problem seemed to be that the wireless signal varies with time.  The Internet website requires a considerable amount of connect time and I just wasn't getting it.  I would get some of the needed information and then the line would go dead - very frustrating.  For no perceivable reason, after an hour or so, the system started working and I was able to upload our first British page.  Then the computer battery ran out and I had to quit.  Hopefully, all these problems will go away when the phone gets installed on Tuesday. While I was at the library, Nancy walked over to the Galleries Shopping Center and picked up some more miscellaneous stuff (like a curling iron).  Couldn't find a phone ( to buy), though. On Monday the four of us piled into B&P?s KIA rental car and headed for Wales.  Wales is only about 30 miles away (one of the reasons for picking Bristol) and there is a good freeway the whole way.  We headed for Cardiff with the day's goal being the St. Fagans National History Museum.  We found it with Pam acting as Bruce's co-pilot and map reader (her most common statement was "I don't even know where we are on this map"), but we did find it.  I immediately liked this place because except for parking it was free.

This is the Pig Stye behind the house.  The dome stucture is the pigs house.  The walls and the pig house are made without morter - The Welsh pride themselve on being able to build without glue.

This farmhhouse had been built in the North and moved to this House museum.  I had to duck at every doorway and hall.  The red color was believed to ward evil spirits

The Museum was huge, 100 acres, with a castle (built by a lawyer) and a house museum.  The house museum was a collection of homes and business moved here from all over Wales.  The houses were of varying ages including some with dirt floors and head-knocking doorways all the way to a house of the future - showing many energy-saving and recycling features.

The row house is behind the tourist (B&P) on the left - the white building is the horse barn.

Row house display - Newest house 1955 is the closest

One fascinating feature was a row-house complex in which each home was from a different time. The row houses were originally the homes of ironmongers and showed how people lived in them over 50-year cycles.  The first house was from 1805 and the last 1955.  All the signs and printings were both in English and Welsh.  Wales is trying desperately to keep and maintain its heritage and language.  There was no way to do this museum justice in just one day, but we did the best we could and then headed home.

The museum had a rather extensive weaving mill - under construction - but did have some old hand looms

The Castle garden is shown above with the "Castle House" below - This house was built by a well-to-do lawyer

On our way to Wales, we had noticed a Costco just west of Bristol, on the coast at Avonmouth.  Had to stop on the way back for dinner at Costco's fine dining facilities and to compare it with the California stores.  The first difference we immediately noticed was the Avonmouth Costco's parking lot was nearly empty. This was a new store, open only since last June. Once inside we could have been in any Costco anywhere except that there were very few people.  Nancy and Pam had to shop but once that was out of the way we headed straight for a Costco pizza - just like home.

Getting home from Costco, a distance of 3-4 miles, was quite an adventure.  A wrong turn out of the parking lot sent us on the freeway to Wales with no exit 'til the bridge.  At the bridge entrance we attempted a U-turn on a traffic circle and with a much-disputed wrong turn (three co-pilots and one driver) we ended up on the freeway to London.  Again we were on a limited access freeway but making damn good time.  The next option was the northern entrance to the city of Bristol.  Crossing Bristol was something we had feared, but it wasn't all that bad.  We got home from Costco having traversed approximately 30 miles. There is a computer store near the house and we stopped at it so J&N could buy a phone for the much anticipated installation.  Then, we headed home and found a parking space, sort of.  About 20 minutes later a firm parking space opened up and Bruce moved the car and relaxed for the evening.

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