Cardiff

June 13, 2013

We woke up to grey skies, wind, and rain, so we decided to spend the morning relaxing and catching up on things. Antonio and Fadia had gone to work so it was just the three of us. But about 11 am the skies brightened, so we headed out for our walk around Cardiff Bay.

We went the same way we’d gone last night to start with. Passing by the white-water canoe centre we saw a few athletes training, and then we saw a boat loaded with obvious non-athletes. So we paused to watch as they lurched and spun down the course. Passing by the Oystercatcher pub we noticed that the wind hadn’t actually stopped and neither had the rain, as there were frequent squalls. However we continued around the south side of the bay. This area used to be the port, where coal ships used to come to load up. Now it has all been reclaimed for housing and parks, and there is a big marina full of pleasure boats.

We headed across the walkway to the barrage, which separates the ocean from the bay. It was still very windy and raining a bit, so we continued quickly across it to the Norwegian Sailors’ Church. The church was originally built by Norwegian sailors back in the days when there was a busy port, but now it is no longer a church, but rather a nice café where we decided to have lunch. Paul had the Norwegian Fisherman’s Lunch and Rosemary had a jacket potato.

Neil had brought along a treasure hunt for Cardiff, like the one we had done back in Chipping Campden. Actually this one was more like a spy puzzle, but the basic idea was still going around and finding things which provided answers. We were starting from somewhere in the middle, and as Neil knew his way around Cardiff he directed us to various places to pick up the earlier clues. This was a bit confusing. The puzzle took us through the town centre with all its public art displays and over into a small wildlife refuge. In the end we didn’t solve the puzzle and we couldn’t quite tell why. Perhaps things had been moved or changed since the puzzle was originally constructed.

We then walked back to Neil’s house, unfortunately over the busy highway bridge. We stopped off at Morrison’s on the way to buy some lemon sole and other things for dinner. Neil cooked the meal, which was very good. Antonio and Fadia went out for dinner but were home early, so we chatted with Fadia while Antonio “helped” Neil to install new taps on the bathtub.

Previous: Off we go to Wales
Next: Merthyr Tydfil