St. Fagan's

Graham and Jane collected me from having Saturday coffee/brunch with James at Hoffi Coffee around the corner from my house and were quite amused by my simplistic enjoyment of the excursion :) St. Fagan's is a museum of Welsh life and is a completely interactive experience -- they have hay harvesting, and sheep and cows and spinning demonstrations! It is a great outing for families (and people like self) and I heard people speaking Welsh to their children! Buildings from all over Wales have been donated to this museum and were marked and then reassembled on this site to provide examples of how life was in different periods.

One terrace of six houses, moves forward 50 years or so at a time as you move from house to house -- very interesting to see how material things become more and more a part of everyday life as history moves forward.

Mining companies built Workman's Institutes for miners to have access to education and entertainment after working. Library and class rooms and a theatre. Children as young as 14 worked in the mines! Graham's grandfather and great-grandfather worked in mines in the north of England.

Beautiful gardens and a fortified castle on the other side of the park. Greenhouses have grapes growing along the roof supports and other plants on the floor -- very nifty :) I pricked my finger picking a sprig of hawthorn from a hedgerow.

Graham and Jane are quite personable and good fun to visit! Graham thinks he is going to teach me to drive...... At least the car is automatic.


7.30 -- dinner party at the Hobbit Hole! Hiroko made fried rice, Jimmi and I made salad, Clare brought spicy chicken wings and Omar made pasta with salmon cream sauce. Ate much earlier than the night before. We're getting the furniture arranged in the best way for entertaining -- a good thing that we have such a large space downstairs!