August 7 - August 17

Here is a big post. This post includes a long weekend trip to Wales and a week long trip to Northern Ireland, Ireland and the Isle of Man.

While in Liverpool, wandered past Anfield Football Stadium where Liverpool FC plays. Happened to be a big game there and I hear that they are now in the World Championship so good luck to them. We also went on a Cain's Brewery tour which was pretty good.

Ok, onto a trip further from our flat. We set off in our rental Ford Ka for Chester, England. Well known for its well preserved architecture (from 1st - 19th centuries especially), Roman ruins and Tudor style row buildings. A great walking tour (containing much good natured and murderous teasing on nearby Welsh culture) included a long journey around the city's circumferential wall. This city was very fortunate to have its architecture and walls protected from Hitler's Blitz. I would put this town high on my list of places to visit or even visit again.

Next up, we crossed the border into Wales and visited a disappointed private castle home. Fortunately a guard there recommended Conwy Castle (as our flat maintenance man did). We were very very happy with this castle and the town of Conwy, Wales. It was an archtypical castle, although gutted, and next to a wonderfully picturesque martime village. This town also had a another surrounding wall which was able to be walked on (like Chester).

We spent the night in yet another walled city called Llandreron or something, picturesque as well, and we visited a nearby pub which was oddly called the Little Black Boy Inn or something. Good beers, though. We tried to understand the Welsh language while eavesdropping but we had just as much luck with that as we did with the signs.

We drove through the scary looking mountains of SnowdoniaPark and had some rain and clouds. The roads here were bettered only by the ones in the Scottish Highlands so I enjoyed revving up the Ka and running it around the turns. I guess this explains why Top Gear regularly films around here.

The next day was spent in Cardiff and a great hostel (Riverhouse Backpackers was probably the best hostel we ever did or ever will stay in). Frankly we were pretty tired and broke from our earlier spending so we didnt do much here except eat and look around downtown and the riverside park. I did see the Millenium Stadium which is home of some stages of the WRC Rally GB.