Exploring the Welsh coast: Aberaeron and New Quay

by Sean McLachlan on


Yesterday I mentioned that Aberystwyth is a good base from which to explore western Wales. On our second day in Wales my wife, son, and I hopped on a local bus and went south down the Welsh coast to the ports of Aberaeron and New Quay. Aberaeron is about 40 minutes from Aberystwyth and New Quay is only about 20 minutes further south from Aberaeron.

While we didn’t have long in Aberaeron, we liked this tidy little Welsh town with its brightly painted houses and fine view of the sea. There are plenty of shops, restaurants, and pubs and we got the impression that it might be a better place to stay than Aberystwyth. Like in Aberystwyth, we heard a lot of people speaking Welsh. Most signs are in both languages. It’s nice to know that the language is surviving in the age of globalized English.

At New Quay we stopped for lunch at a pub on a cliff overlooking a sandy beach and broad harbor. The view was nice but service was slow and the food substandard. Sadly, this was the case with all too many of our meals in Wales, even though we usually followed local advice as to where to eat.

%Gallery-129265%The famous writer Dylan Thomas lived here for a time and New Quay was the inspiration for his fictional town of Llareggub (“bugger all” spelled backwards). Visitors interested in literary tourism can follow the Dylan Thomas Trail.

We’d come to take a boat trip instead. My five-year-old had never been out to sea so we decided to remedy that by going on one of New Quay’s many dolphin tours. Dolphins are abundant in these waters; we’d seen several from the window of the Seabrin Guest House in Aberystwyth. We chose a tour run by the Cardigan Bay Marine Wildlife Centre, which uses its profits to fund research into the sea life on this part of the Welsh coast. The sea was calm and the sun shone fine so we weren’t worried as we stepped aboard an inflatable motorboat with a half dozen other people.

This good weather was our undoing. The calm conditions had made the fish move further out to sea, and the dolphins had followed them. As we made our way down the coast on our one-hour ride we saw exactly none. Oh well. It’s best to remember that nature isn’t there for our amusement.

This stretch of Welsh coastline is beautiful, with jagged rocks rising high out of the sea. The strata of the rocks is clearly visible, which allowed me to give the kid a lesson in geology, and the cliffs are dotted with numerous caves that smugglers (our boat captain called them “pirates”) used to elude the customs agents. My son was more disappointed about there being no pirates than he was about the lack of dolphins! All was made better when he got to sit in the captain’s chair.

One local told me that New Quay isn’t the most pleasant place to be at night in the summertime. A lot of rough people come into town to get drunk and start fights, and two of his friends got knifed in one incident. We saw a big fight in Aberystwyth too. This isn’t unusual in the UK. When I lived in London, I regularly saw fights on the street on Friday and Saturday nights. It’s just a sad fact of life in this part of the world.

Still, we had a nice day and the kid had a great time and got to experience something new, which is what really matters. Tomorrow I’ll be blogging about a steam train we took through some beautiful Welsh countryside. Unlike my last two posts on Wales, this one will be entirely positive!

Five ways to get the most out of your Luxembourg trip

by Tom Johansmeyer on

Luxembourg is a tiny, interesting place. It probably isn’t a destination in itself for most people, but it can be a great side trip from Paris, parts of Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands. If you can tack a few days onto your next vacation to that part of Europe, Luxembourg is a fun spot that you’d probably never visit otherwise.

Since your time in Luxembourg is likely to be short – and dependent upon other factors in your vacation – it can help to have a few ideas in mind before you hit the ground. You want to make the most of your experience, of course, while minimizing the aggravation that can come with going from Point A to Point B. Below, you’ll find five tips for making your Luxembourg visit easier and more enjoyable.

%Gallery-129220%1. Dip into the valley: up on the hill, Luxembourg is a city. It’s reasonably large and more interesting (as a city) than the likes of Amsterdam and Brussels, but it’s still a run-of-the-mill city. Step onto one of the walking paths, though, and you’ll descend into the Old Europe you’d expect from this microstate. Wander the winding streets, and enjoy the architecture that reminds you what the meaning of “classic” is. Interestingly, you’ll get a shock to the system when you see old and new side by side. There’s an interesting mix of contemporary and traditional architecture in Luxembourg, which gives the towns below a more organic vibe.

2. Drink the local wine: it’s old hat for most travelers to sample the local stuff when visiting a new place. Trying new food and drinks is part of the fun! The food in Luxembourg won’t strike you as particularly exotic (though you can find a good meal there), but the wine is a different story. Crisp, flavorful and a pure pleasure to drink, you’ll find the perfect afternoon kicking back bottle after bottle while sitting outside and watching the people pass by.

3. Don’t bother paying for the bus: in the mood for some international crime? The buses in Luxembourg provide the perfect opportunity. You have to pay to take them, but the bus drivers don’t check to see if you have a ticket. They don’t care. So, you can step onto the bus and go where you want without paying a dime. You are running a risk, however. The fines are steep if you get caught by the authorities tasked with spot-checking for tickets.

Of course, I’m not advocating such illicit behavior. Buy a damned ticket – they’re cheap.

4. Stay for the right amount of time: you don’t want to breeze through Luxembourg in an afternoon … but staying for a week probably doesn’t make sense. Give yourself two or three days, depending on how much time you want to invest in #2, above.

5. Spring for a hotel downtown: to save a few bucks, I stayed out in the business district. It was a lot cheaper, and bus access to the city was fast, easy and reliable. But, it’s still a lot more enjoyable to roll out of bed and head right into the action.

Five Belgian chocolate statues and their inspirations

by Tom Johansmeyer on

When you wander through Europe, you run into statues (literally, if you have your nose stuck in your guidebook). There are lots of ’em, and they’re all old. Some are incredibly impressive: I still have a soft spot, of sorts, for Venus de Milo. Others, however, are utterly forgettable – vast collections of stone or metal that are important while falling short of stunning.

Visit Bruges, Belgium, and the rules change entirely.

Sure, there are plenty of statues, including a piece by Michaelangelo that somehow found its way out of Italy (this doesn’t happen much, to be honest). The interesting stuff isn’t sitting in churches or etched from stone. Rather, it’s built from a distinctly Belgian medium: chocolate.

I’m not joking.

Spend a few minutes in Belgium, and you’ll be bombarded by the sweet stuff (you’ll even be encouraged to stick some up your nose). There’s chocolate everywhere, and as I saw shortly after I hit the ground in Bruges, it’s even on display.

The local chocolate museum, Choco-Story, is home to quite a few of them – unsurprising, really, given that the propaganda exhibition museum has the tools and expertise necessary to make it happen. There are a few more elsewhere in the city, though, and you should keep an eye out for unique, interesting and tasty creations all over the cute little city.

Below, you’ll find five interesting chocolate creations, along with some guesses at what may have inspired them. In some cases, it’s a straight line from the real world to chocolate equivalent, but I will admit I stretched plausibility in a few places. Ultimately, the extent to which I may have fudged is up to you!

%Gallery-129173%

London Olympics 2012: One year to go celebrated today

by Chris Owen on

The 12-month countdown to the greatest sporting show on earth is under way this week as London reaches the one year to go mark for the 2012 summer Olympics. Today, Olympic athletes from across Europe come together at a star-studded day marking the occasion along with fans invited to Eurostar’s London 2012 Olympic celebrations.

Over the last few months, thousands of Olympic fans have entered competitions to win the chance to be part of Eurostar’s ‘One year to go’ celebrations. Arriving from countries including France, and Belgium, competition winners and athletes will be joined by winners from the UK to be greeted by double world champion and Olympic silver medalist Colin Jackson and others then join them in having their foot prints cast in clay as they symbolically mark the first steps on the way to the 2012 Games

“This is such a wonderful opportunity for members of the public to experience the London 2012 Olympic Games firsthand” Jackson told the Hillingdon Times.

.Following a welcome speeches from dignitaries, winners will then be transported to a celebration lunch held at an London restaurant with stunning views over the Olympic Park where Jackson will be their host for the remainder of their unique experience.

As the Official International Rail Services Provider to London 2012, Eurostar will bring hundreds of thousands of sports fans from the continent to London.

Flickr photo by spcbrass

Related Stories

Video: acorn becoming oak tree time-lapse

by Elizabeth Seward on

Ever wanted to watch an acorn as it slowly becomes an oak tree? But, you know, watch it all rather quickly since to watch it actually would take, I don’t know, say, eight months? Eight months is how long it took plant-lover and and filmmaker, Neil Bromhall, to put together this insightful time-lapse video. His Nikon D300 camera was programmed with a 55mm macro lens and took exposures every two hours for eight months of the little acorn as it grew. Maybe I’m just a plants-captured-while-growing novice, but I think this is fascinating.

We all have our own motivations for traveling. We escape. We familiarize ourselves with the unfamiliar. We learn languages. We adjust. But one element of travel that seems to allure most everyone is landscape. I love to travel so that I can see this world for all that it naturally is instead of just the scenery in front of my face as I move in and out of each day. For me, this boils down to the beaches, the mountains, the forests… and the forests boil down to this.

Enjoy.