Cardiff!

I decided I wanted to go to Cardiff. I was fed up trying to wait around and make it work with friends, and it gets complicated because I have to plan my time around shabbos and most of my American friends here interested in traveling aren’t Jewish.

So I looked up the Rabbi and JSoc in Cardiff and started emailing around. Rabbi Wollenberg, a Chabad rabbi for the Orthodox shul (there is also a Reform one, but I never did see it) got back to me and said he could work out meals, and I said I would stay at a hostel or something if necessary, so Thursday evening he got back to me and said it could work out!

It was bit late notice, and I had a midterm on Tuesday, but again this is Cardiff and I really, really, really wanted to go back. Leora and I went during our whirlwind tour this summer, and it was such a nice city, and there were a few things we didn’t manage to do.

So he booked me into a guesthouse near the shul for Friday night, and I started looking into buying tickets on short notice. Anyone who knows traveling in the UK will tell you, book early for good prices. I wanted to try for a train both ways, but going to Cardiff Friday morning was £44 and up to something like £150. A bus took longer and was more uncomfortable (and less cool) but I found one for £14. I could have taken a bus back as well for something like £8, but I found a train for £11.50 from Cardiff to London, and I splurged for the way back. Then I packed. Quickly.

My bus left at 8am, so I woke up at 5:45, showered and ran out the door. It was a National Express bus, so it was a ten-minute walk from the tube station. Leora and I have experience on that route, remember? We took those ten minutes at a run, that time. I was running a little late, but I made the bus. I tried to study, and I dozed for about an hour out of the ride, and I took about a dozen pictures of Newport when we passed through it to Cardiff.

I wasn’t sure what to do in Cardiff at first, so I went to the Tourist Information Center (TIC) in town to find out some information I wanted. Last time we were there, Leora and I wanted to visit these two castles – Castell Coch and Caerphilly Castle, but we didn’t have time. I grabbed the brochures, and got directions to the National Museum Wales. It was a nice museum, and took me a bit longer than expected to leave, so I was late to my guesthouse. I only showed up about 20 minutes before shabbos, took the fastest shower ever, and then took directions from the shul to the guesthouse.

Now, I’m going to put in a video, but some of my pronunciation sounds really wrong in the playback. The guesthouse was on Ty Gwyn Road, pronounced “TEE GWEEN” road. I took the video Sunday morning, after shabbos. In the video, it sounds like I mispronounce it and then misspell it. I have to assume it was the audio quality, because I didn’t misremember it at the time! Really!

Friday night was really nice, they were having a shul-wide dinner in the hall, so I seated with a local family and we chatted. The Rabbi and Rebbetzin walked me back to the guesthouse, which was incredibly nice of them. I woke up a little late the next day, but I made it to shul and I went to the Rabbi’s for lunch, with a bunch of other people in the shul. It was really nice, and I stayed until after shabbos and got a ride back to the guesthouse from Laura.

She offered to take me around Cardiff on Sunday afternoon with her husband, as they normal around a bit. She said if I met her in shul on Sunday morning, her husband could drive me into town and I could meet them later. So I went to shul in the morning (hence these videos).

In town I wandered through some arcades and walked to the bay, and then I came back and we went to Llandaff North and Castell Coch and I got to hear lots of stories. It’s always nicer to hear about places from people who actually live there. Plus, as Leora and Dasi can both attest, I love Cardiff, so it was great to have someone to chat with. 😀