Last Monday we set off on our journey to Cardiff. If you didn’t read the background behind our little trip, then you can read about it here, but it was mainly a little holiday away from the trials of everyday life!
The journey from mine to Cardiff is supposed to take just over 3 hours, but it seemed to take far longer than that! There is nothing more satisfying than getting across the Severn bridge and spying the sign into Wales!
Unsurprisingly, after all the hot weather we have had lately, it decided to bucket down with rain for the majority of the time we were in Wales, with the first spell being as we crossed that border. It’s inevitable, but it would have been nice if I had realised that before packing summer dresses for the week!
Needless to say, we eventually arrived in Cardiff and after settling all of our things down in our room, we decided to spend a couple of hours exploring the shopping centre. If I can say anything about Wales, it’s that everyone seemed so much friendlier and everywhere was so much cleaner! They have a relatively new rule in place (2011) where there is a minimum charge of 5p for a single use bag. You would be surprised how much of a difference it makes, as quite often you just get a carrier bag for the sake of it rather than contemplating whether it is actually necessary. I think that from now on I will think more about whether I do need a bag; this website explains it really well: http://www.carrierbagchargewales.gov.uk/retailers/?lang=en. We stopped into Primark and I came across a Bowie top which was more of an impulse buy than anything; I have wanted one for a while and I thought that whist I saw one for a fairly reasonable price, I would get it. I have never before been to a pleasant Primark before, as normally they resemble a poorly organised jumble sale and the staff are normally extremely rude. In the Cardiff branch, however, the lady at the cash desk was so lovely. I’m a bit frustrated with myself that I didn’t catch her name so I could write them a nice email (I rarely write a nice email), but she was just generally obliging.
In the evening we found a nice little (well, big) bar, called the Brewhouse, where we had a delicious dinner (2 for 1 burgers, yes please!) and then stayed to listen to some live music. In chatting to the staff on Twitter, I found out that the performer on that particular evening (I hadn’t paid full attention at the time) was called Rob Cross. He did all sorts of music, both fairly recent songs and some classics. I remember our waiter mentioning that he calls Rob, Johnny Cash because he sounded a little like him. Being the forgetful person I am, I completely forgot to take a photograph when the guy was on stage, but here is a photograph of the empty stage!
The decor was rather interesting, too, as there were vinyl records around the room to act as a border whilst there was instruments hanging from the ceiling to act as lightshades:
Overall it made a really relaxing end to a busy day, and little did we know that it would have made such an impression on us that we would end up spending most evenings in there!
Keep reading this week for the rest of this travel series, which will hopefully be updated daily.
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