Cardiff Sept 9th to 13th 2019

We set off just after lunch, having taken care of some last minute jobs around town, hitched up the caravan and began our journey to Cardiff. We trundled along, munching on road trip sweets and listening to the radio. Smooth sailing, right?

Wrong.

Not the best start to a holiday!

Just around the Kilgetty mark, it was apparent that there was something wrong with the van. Stuck in third gear, with no reverse, or ability to get moving again if we stopped, we needed help. We parked up in the Begelly Arms, and the owners of the pub graciously allowed us to store our caravan there until the van was fixed. The parents made some phone calls and all that was left to do was wait. The idleness didn't last long, maybe fifteen minutes went by before our knight in a fluorescent jacket turned up to take us home. The good news was that the van was fixed within minutes of it being dropped off at a garage and we could resume our holiday the next day.

Once we made it to our set destination, we set up with caravan arriving around eleven, meaning we still had some time to check off one of our activities, visiting the museum!

I very much enjoyed looking at all the fossils and the patterns that occur in nature.

The next day we visited the castle! Exploring the keep, the ramparts, the house, and learning about the history of the castle was amazing, there was even a trebuchet to look at (which I sadly didn't take a picture of).

However there was a heavy focus on war throughout the history of Wales in some of the exhibitions, the first one started off fun. They had guns that you could lift up and old fashioned military clothes to try, but as we progressed through the exhibition and the more I read, the less I enjoyed it. I ended up focusing on the young lives that had been wasted by war, and that if their deaths were worth it, we certainly have not learnt our lesson. The fact that there are still wars raging on today proves that. The second exhibition illustrated the important role the castle took in sheltering people during World War Two, and it was absolutely harrowing. The whole way down the dark corridor were old beds and benches, a small canteen and medical supplies. Worst of all was the speakers. Just as we entered the tunnel, the broadcast informing people of Britain that they were at war with Germany was playing. I could feel my heart sink and the cold crept in. The rest of the time, the speakers resounded with an air raid siren and 1930s music which seemed both inappropriate and contrastingly fitting.

I attempted to capture the songs reverberating off the stone walls, I always forget to record longer than I think I need to.

Once we'd seen all the castle had to offer, we ventured into Cardiff for a couple of hours before our parking expired. I picked myself up a couple of comics and rested in Cafe Nero.

Our final day had a rather low standard set, as I'd already visited this next place a couple of times with school. St. Fagans collects and reconstructs buildings from around Wales, the first time I set foot there, I'd been terrified out of my mind due to a 'day in the life of a Victorian school child' experience and the second time, we'd been rushed around the attractions because of the outrageous amount of time it took us to get there. This time however, I loved it. We made a beeline for the Iron Age roundhouses from Anglesey, which were awesome - I could quite happily live in one. From there we simply picked out which buildings took our fancy, we even stumbled across a merchant trader's house from Haverfordwest! We couldn't believe it. There were old shops, churches and a blacksmith, it was seriously so cool. Would recommend.

For whatever reason, the gallery refuses to put my photos in the order that I took them. Overall an awesome holiday. Looking back through the photos, I realised that I'd taken an awful lot of pictures of chairs and so, to finish, a small 'chairs across the ages' gallery:

Until next time,

Mort

Cilgerran 26th Aug 2019

Since my brother will be learning about castles in September, we decided to visit Cilgerran castle this bank holiday. We expected to walk around a quiet ruin, read the information signs, take some photos and be done with the place - but what we experienced was so much more exciting.

Once we'd paid our entrance fee, we ambled into the castle grounds and weren't greeted by the empty green courtyard we were anticipating. We'd stumbled into a two day only medieval re-enactment camp! There were tents, re-enactors and visitors scattered around the place with bows, swords and shields on display. We approached the first tent, unsure of what to expect. Dad pointed out that they had long bows as we neared, and as if he'd just been stung, the man at the tent turned his attention to us and graciously explained that the 'long bow' was actually just a 'bow'. To the medieval people the long bow was a bow, and it was the Victorians who dubbed it a long bow as their 'bows' were much shorter - people of the medieval times called these shorter bows, well, 'short bows'.

Shortly after that discussion, a call rang throughout the camp, informing everyone that a demonstration and talk about armour was about to begin. We all crowded around and watched. It would take the demonstrator around fifteen minutes to put her armour on, if she wasn't talking to all of us as she went - ten minutes at a push. Her armour weighed a whopping twenty-five kilograms, however, her companion's armour meant that he was carrying around an even more impressive forty-six kilograms!

After this, we were all treated to a sword fight! In a coliseum-esque fashion, we all crowded around the arena and watched as the two competitors entered the ring. As the two fought with all their might, the clang of metal was astounding! The battle took place in short bursts, and very quickly, the two skilled fighters were dripping sweat and calling for water.

Video credit to mum!

Next we explored the rest of the castle, and found another aspect of the camp, the tent of the fighters! We managed to have a close up look of the helmets and weapons, feeling the weight of them in turn. The helmet (pictured on the right of the picture below) weighed seven kilograms, distributing the weight across the shoulders - the inside was not unlike a motorbike helmet - and his opponents helmet (on the left), while looking a lot more hefty and threatening, weighed much less. He disclosed to us that his helmet had been made in Ukraine!

The array of swords were very fun to handle as he explained in which types of battles he like to use each one in, he even had a flail on the table - however these were never used in battle, only possibly in coliseums.

On the way home, we also stopped off at Pentre Ifan, the cairn was very atmospheric and it's always baffled me how people could build something like it - the amount of prior planning and sheer precision is truly awesome.

I feel incredibly lucky to have all of these amazing places a stone's throw away from my home, today has been truly wonderful and I've learnt so much - it's not something that I'm going to forget any time soon.

Until next time,

Mort

Maya Pantheon: The Bacabs

The cardinal directions, and their symbols

The Maya believed that the Earth was flat and that it was carried by a great turtle, the Bacabs were four brothers said to be the offspring of the Moon goddess Ix Chel, and the creation/Sun god Itzamna, however there is some speculation that they are four different aspects of one single deity. They stood at the four corners of the Earth, keeping the thirteen layers of the sky from crashing into the Earth and the nine layers of the underworld. They represent the four cardinal directions and their associated colours:

A representation of the Ceiba Tree

Zac Cimi stands in the west and their related colour is black, Hozanek guards the south and is linked to the colour yellow, Hobnil takes the east and is associated with the colour of red, and Can Tzicnal looms in the north and connected with the colour white. In between them all, is the fifth cardinal direction drawing towards the centre of the world, and at the centre sits the Ceiba Tree (World Tree) which reaches through the Earth into both the sky and underworld.