A Welsh Weekend

{Chepstow Castle}

This weekend was very fun; I got to experience a lot of natural beauty in the south of Wales. Now, I’m a city girl, I absolutely love going to school in Philadelphia and now London; cities have so much to offer and I’m glad I get to live in one while at university and young.  However, I love the country and am going to live in a more rural area probably for the majority of my life.  So, seeing the countryside this weekend was wonderful, I’ve definitely come to fall in love with the countryside in England and Wales.

{A wall that is a part of the castle}

 I was in the Wye valley of Wales this weekend, and our first stop was the castle of Chepstow.  It was so much fun running around the castle discovering little nooks and crannies and hidden doorways.  J.K.Rowling lived in a town very close to Chepstow as a teenager and had to walk through the town to get to her school. Two of the streets are said to be the inspiration for Diagon Alley. I love Harry Potter and loved this fun fact, and that I ate lunch on the street.  I had a traditional welsh meal for lunch, lamb cawl, which was kind of like a lamb stew and delicious. 

{Small portion of the castle}

{Diagon Alley inspiration!}

Next was Tintern, known for their ruined abbey.  The abbey was gorgeous and we also walked up a hill to a small deserted church where the builders of the abbey worshipped.  It’s known for black magic being performed there and there was a very pretty view of the valley form up there. 

{Tintern Abbey}

{Inside of the deserted Church}

Hay-on-Wye was a little town known as the “town of books” because of all their secondhand bookshops.  It was very cute, but not much to do there.  Or in the part of Wales we were in, in general, but it was gorgeous.

{Adorable decorations outside a bookshop}

Our hostel was actually very nice and I’m pleased to say I survived my first hostel experience.  The best part of the trip was horseback riding through the Brecon Beacons National Park. Unfortunately I couldn’t take pictures while horseback riding, because it would have been dangerous.  But believe me when I say it was breath-taking.  I rode a beautiful brown horse named Rain.  We rode for three hours thorugh the valley and then up one of the mountains and back down.  It was actually rather dangerous I thought, because we were going through mud, grass, streams with slippery rocks, tiny mud trails next to cliffs, cement, and cars at one point. Oh, and wild sheep.  If I had a pound for every sheep I saw this weekend, I would be rich.  It was a wonderful experience, albeit we are all very sore from it. 

{The end when we got back to the stables; we were both exhausted}

{The national park we rode through}

P.S. A friend asked me to write specifically about travelling while abroad and things like getting a phone and such.  Now that I’ve been to another country and have some experience I can give some advice. But I’ll write in depth about that later this week.