I woke up this morning to something truly lovely: the window just above my bed seemed to be spilling over with thick golden sunshine. My entire white room was painted a really warm yellow and the wood floor nearly glowed a gold color. It's times like these that I'm so glad I woke up!
I turned off my alarm and took my time getting up. Though it was Saturday, Tom had scheduled us to take a tour of Cardiff Castle at 10am. I quickly got ready and whipped up a nice breakfast before everyone met at our house. At a quarter till, we all headed out and walked down towards the Hays, where the giant Castle made up the whole bottom end of Bute Park.
After Tom 'paid and displayed' (there are always a gazillion signs at these sights reminding us to do just that), we were allowed through the outer wall gates. The inner ward was gigantic! The place had certainly been renovated over the years. Tom even pointed out that the enormous walls were rebuilt upon the old wall foundations about 50 years ago. Sure enough, a single layer of reddish bricks differentiated the new stone above from the ancient foundation wall below. The ward looked like it had been used many times for festival reenactments; a few colored canopies were scattered here and there, a few people were in costume, one man was helping people hammer press their own Roman coins, a set of stockades couldn't be missed, and a gigantic trebuchet in the corner made this place a mideaval-junkie's playground.
We were led over to the far edge of the ward where a large rectangular and heavily gothic-styled building sat. This was once the home of one of the wealthiest families in all of Britain. The original builder, a man who's name I need to check my tour pamphlet for actually, made his fortune as the owner of pretty much all the coal mines in Britain. Yeah, that would have made a dollar or two, I suppose.
We walked all through the house, and it was indeed another lavish one. It wasn't as beautiful as Penrhyn, but it probably rivaled Coch. Let's put it this way: the room created for taking a nap had an exquisite mirror-tiled ceiling with the greek word for 'truth' painted both frontwards and backwards, along the lattice wood work, so it could be read as truth through normal viewing or when viewed through the mirrors. The top level of a tower had been opened up to the sky and a whole Roman fountain area had been created in the center, while the stories of the life of Elijah had been painted along all the surrounding walls which were described in Hebrew that ran all along underneath. Even the children's playrooms were heavily decorated with paintings of children's story characters as well as the authors. Their library was very tight and small, but it was warm and beautiful. Apparently the producers of Dr. Who thought so too, as this apparently was the film site of an episode called 'Journey to the Center of the Tartus.'
At the end of our tour, Josie, Theresa, Abbey, and I decided to head out right away. We walked out the far door of the library, followed the only hallway into a few rooms we had already seen, and then continued right into the front area of the library again. We were completely bewildered; how the heck had we just gone full circle by going along the only passageway? We never saw the route to the entrance room, just the one hallway. Yet here we are, right back at the library. Josie laughed the most; apparently, Dr. Who had had the exact same problem in the episode they filmed here. After we stopped to ask for some directions, we were shown a doorway within one of the bay windows that lead outside. Not my most observant moment, but I prefer to laugh anyway.
Once we escaped, we admired the cool old cars that were parked outside, apparently for the wedding that was going on in the lower rooms of the great house. I don't really remember why, but I split up with this group when I ran into Bronte, as we had very similar interests in how to spend our afternoon. I think it was because the others wanted to go to the llifergell.
So Bronte and I went up into the keep of the castle grounds, a crazy strong fortress that was built by the Normans way back when they conquered this land. After we looked around for a bit, we left the castle and walked across the street to the shopping arcades that make up the Hays. I don't think I've mentioned this, but an arcade is a covered strip mall, and there are like five or six long arcades that interwine through the Hays, so it's pretty much like a shopaholic's dream labyrinth. We saw a few little things that we were very interested in, but we were both starving. We decided to make the long walk home, make some lunch, and then come back together, so we wouldn't end up buying lunch. The weather was lovely, so I really enjoyed the stroll home.
After I whipped up some lunch and met up with Bronte again, we walked back to the Hays and had a ball. I found so many great presents!! I found the coolest things in the world for a bunch of people, including the most incredible gift for my parent's anniversary when I get back! Oh, good times were had as I scored killer sales. Seriously, I did the math and I saved over a hundred pounds on the stuff I collected today. I'm so excited to see what everyone thinks about their things!
I also found a lovely little notebook for two pounds that I'll be using as my sketchbook the next few weeks. I've really kind of had a major blast sketching out my travel mate's sitting and standing postures (uh, without written consent), but I've been using more paper in my trusty little black book than I want to, so it was time my sketches actually earned their own book.
Feeling pretty awesome about life, Bronte and I made the trip home, where I made some Greek yogurt stuff for a healthy light dinner, and then put away my special finds. I sat down heavily on our plush brown couch, pulled out my ipad, and was just ready to let my brain veg out on the www, when Tom reminded me that I was going to be playing in church the following day. Oh, yeah. We had talked about that a few days before, but I had forgotten.
Cool, time to go to work. My brain flipped into 'get er done' mode, and the people upstairs played a very key role in my finding three lovely piano/violin hymn arrangements in almost no time flat. I looked over the parts, called over to Calysta at the other house on Tom's phone, and checked to see if she was still up for accompanying me. She is a brilliant concert pianist, so she seemed super chill about the whole sight reading thing. I told her I'd be by in a few minutes, which I was, and we looked over the pieces. As much as I wanted to transpose a gorgeous viola/piano arrangement of Kolob, something spoke reason to me and we picked the 'Come Follow Me' instead.
I went home, ran into a few complications with getting the music printed (Occam's Razor required two computers, a jump drive, my ipad, and waiting on a movie for this little puzzle), and then finally relaxed once I was holding a stack of papers in my hand.
I probably should have gone upstairs and practiced, but I was feeling kind of shot. So, I was lazy. My posse was just making dinner and was planning on watching Les Mis just afterwards, so I went upstairs and took a shower while they ate. I came back just in time for the movie, which was great.
I worked on my journal during most of it, but it was really great to be able to watch the movie again for the second time after having seen the REAL Les Mis. I found that I really appreciated that the set were gigantic and beautiful in the movie and that some parts of the songs were drawn out to add weight, but I felt that the actors, voices, and portrayal of the events were FAR better in London. Remember, I had tears everywhere in London; I think I almost teared up once in the movie.
After the movie ended, we all went up to bed. I read my scriptures and then had a really amazing talk with my Heavenly Father. I'm so glad He's there for us.
After a little bit of time for reflection and some notes written out, I fell into a deep sleep.
Till tomorrow, Wales.
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