Lincolnshire to Llangollen

July 11 - Today we drove from Lincolnshire to Wales.  I will say at this point that we probably spent more time than necessary in Lincolnshire - but we have no idea what we’re going to see when we get somewhere, and once the B&B is booked and paid for, we may as well stay.  The highlights were definitely Stamford, Boston and the National Dune areas on the coast!  

It was about a 5 hour drive from the east coast into Wales - we were lucky and didn’t take too many wrong turns, so the trip was fairly smooth.  Imagine driving across a whole country in 5 hours - we can't get across BC in that amount of time!  The highways here are really funny.  One moment, we are cruising along at 50 mph on a reasonable 2-lane road, and the next we’re in the middle of some little wee town with a road that’s really only a lane and a half wide.  So it’s really hard to estimate how long it will take to get anywhere.

One of the main highways into Wales.  It goes through this little town
with a hairpin curve and these two big trucks happened to meet there.
No problem - just drive up onto the sidewalk.  

We arrived in Llangollen Wales, and it turns out there is an international music and dance festival on here all week, so the town is quite crowded and parking is at a definite premium.  We’re staying in a lovely 3-storey ‘Victorian Terrace’ that is a couple of hundred years old.  This AirBnB has a shared kitchen with the owners, so it will be a different experience again.  Lynn, our hostess is very sweet and we immediately felt right at home.  Right now I’m in her charming little sitting room, typing away while she cleans the coal out of the fireplace grate. 

The sitting room in Llangollen

Our current AirBnB.  Our room is the one with the
open window on the third floor.

So.  Pronunciation of Llangollen.  Definitely not what it looks like here.  Double L’s go something like this:  hckl.  So pronounce it hckllongahckllen.  Wrap your mouth around that one.  

All the signs here are in Welsh and English.  The Welsh pronunciations apparently have nothing to do with the phonics of the word.    

Bilingual signs.

I find Canada's other language much easier than Welsh!  Often there's enough
similarity between French and English that I can deduce what something says.
Definitely NOT the case here!

The police have the word Heddlu on the back of their jackets.  This means police.  It’s not pronounced Heddlu.  It’s Hethley or something like that.  There are quite a number of them walking around town, due to the festival.  It’s a classical music festival, and Glen says most of the tourists look like they will be in bed at 9, so he's not sure why they need the police presence.  But they are really quite adorable looking (they probably wouldn’t like to hear that).

Here’s a picture of one that I got talking to.  He’s the one who told me how to pronounce Heddlu.  We also chatted about the hats - they are officially called custodian helmets.  They are a felted wool over some very hard substance (maybe metal?) and inside is almost like a bicycle helmet for fitting it to the head.  They are quite high, although apparently only about half the height they used to be.  My new friend the Heddlu told me that in the old days, they would only hire men who were at least 6’ tall, and then with the custodian helmet on top of their heads, people could always see them in a crowd.  He very kindly allowed me to take his picture, and then offered to take a picture of me with the helmet on.  Each area of the country has a different badge for the front of the hats.  Probably more than you wanted to know about Heddlu hats.

My new Heddlu friend in Llangollen

Honorary Heddlu???

The river that runs through town is the River Dee - it’s absolutely stunning.  All along the banks are these wide flat rock ledges, and even though the river runs quite swiftly, the water around the rocks is shallow, and it’s obviously a great swimming hole for the locals. We had a bite to eat at the old "Corn Mill" on the waterfront, in full-blown sunshine which is something we have really only had a couple of times since we arrived in England.  This looks like a promising place to explore.

Cheese and crackers at the old Corn Mill.  

River Dee looking one direction.  The train station is at the right of
the picture.

River Dee - looking the other way.  Beautiful big
flat rocks to sunbathe, picnic, or swim from

Schoolkids heading home along the River Dee.  I
think this was their last week of school before their
6 week summer break.