Road trippin Day 7: Cardiff and Slimbridge

Welshcakes are yum!
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Today we checked out of Stratford Upon Avon and decided to go to Wales for the day.  As soon as we got past the border at Wales, every sign we passed seemed to be bilingual which was cool, although I don't know how you can put C and W next to each other without a vowel in between. Our port of call was Cardiff which is only an hour or so from England. And also was when I had to ring everyone on Tanz' birthday which I did on the side of the road to Cardiff.

Along the way we checked out some Roman ruins, such as Roman baths which were fully preserved as well as a Roman fort still in tact within the small village. We also had to buy some Welshcakes to try which were really yummy, and like a cross between a scone and a pikelet.

Welshcakes mmmmmm

Cardiff castle
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There was a Lost Prophets concert on that night so the town was overrun with kids dressed in punk outfits, we felt a little out of place as we didn't know we had to dress up! We checked out Cardiff castle which was in the middle of the city and also the shopping mall.  Cardiff castle was very pretty, but we were too late to take the tour inside, which apparently is really over the top and quite garish! Which is a shame cos I'm always in the mood to make fun of other people's bad taste.

The rest of the castle
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It was quite wierd hearing the Welsh tongue of people walking around the streets, it sounds like they are spitting most of the time, and the English speaking Welsh sound like they are singing when the talk.

After wandering around Cardiff and through the mall, which BTW is not airconditioned along with a lot of malls over there, we decided to go check into our hostel for the night. We ended up in a small village called Slimbridge which was not far from Stratford Upon Avon and located on a farm. It was really nice actually and cheap enough for us to get a room to ourselves for the night. Unfortunately there was a young school group staying that night and they thought it was fun to run up and down the hallway all night and bang on each others doors. Other than that it would have been a nice quiet place to stay.  The view from the kitchen was overlooking a bird resevoir and the birds would swim right up to the window.  There was also a viewing conservatory where you could watch them, for those birdwatchers I think. Anyway, a different hostel I suppose, a nice break from all the hostel which have been in busy cities.