Wednesday, June 06, 2007

A Welsh Weekend


What was originally planned as a holiday weekend away turned into a working holiday - but a really nice one! My wife, son and I, had been asked to visit my sister and her husband where they live near Carmarthen in Wales. It is a wonderfully idyllic setting, a small holding perched on a picture perfect Welsh hillside, with swooping countryside surrounding you wherever you look. My sister Sue and her husband Trevor were, as ever, perfect hosts - as were their three cute cats, Tigger, Marley and Bear.

Saturday was nice and relaxing, and we really didn't do a heck of a lot. On the Sunday, the weather was atrocious, but Trevor was keen to get stuck into some surfing so we drove down to Newgale - me, Amanda, Sue and James in the Ford Mondeo (yawn) but Trevor in his Mystery Machine camper van! How cool was that? Down at Newgale the weather seemed worse, so with Trevor rushing down onto the beach, the rest of us decamped to the nice cafe there. After a pleasant lunch we wandered to the beach to watch Trevor in action, but it was a bit too windy and grotty to watch for long. So we headed for the car and went to St David's instead, where James (and the ladies!) were entranced by the Chocolate Shop!

On Monday I was to make my first Henry appearance, this time at the Cynwyl Elfed Dining Club for OAP's. I had given a talk to them before, many years back, but this was a nice return! My sister lives in the hamlet of Esgair near the village of Cynwyl Elfed and she helps out as a volunteer at the Dining Club. I came on after the guests had enjoyed their lunch. We had a lot of good laughs, particularly when I pretended to wrestle with Eric, who I have to say looked a lot more worried than most 9-year-old's I pretend to take on during my school talks! After the end of the talk I got changed and sat and had a cup of tea and a chat with them all. It was lovely, great fun, particularly with my new girlfriend Betty - she and I are running off to the London Eye together!

Tuesday was spent during the day down at Saundersfoot near Tenby with my son blasting up and down the beach, digging sand castles, fishing with a shrimping net and plunging into the welcoming waves. It was so hot! A complete change from Sunday. We had a nice fish and chips lunch in a cafe near the main seafront car park, where wonderful staff were assailed by miserable, never-to-be-satisfied pensioners, and met all this with a smile and politeness. A big thumbs up for that establishment! I wanted to go into Tenby and check out the old post card shop to see if I could find some more Gertie Millar's to add to my collection, but we couldn't find anywhere suitable to park, so it seemed like a suitable time to head back to Esgair. Tuesday evening I appeared for Susan's Cynwyl Elfed Women's Institute as a guest speaker. We had a great time. I am due to appear at the Taunton Westival in July and used this talk as a testing ground for some slightly new material that I am likely to use then. It seemed to go down a storm. I did about half an hour and got a great ovation at the end of it. More tea and biscuits afterwards and then home to watch an appalling horror film with Sue, and so to bed!

Today we had a leisurely packing session in Wales and then headed down the M4 and back to England. Tomorrow I am off to Hugh Sexey's School in Wedmore for a return visit. Should be a blast!The picture on this blog was taken by my sister at the WI bash on Tuesday evening...



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