Vacation Blog Day 12

Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Bob sleeping on the floor didn’t work out so well. His blanket was too short, his CPAP woke him, and it was hard. He eventually gave up and went downstairs to the sofa. It didn’t work great for me either, as I tried to spread out on the bed and thus got out of the one semi-comfortable groove. At least Elijah only woke up once, so he was well rested. When he woke me up in the morning, not knowing what time it was, I just brought him downstairs to nurse him. It was only 6, and as he ate he fell asleep. So I took him back upstairs, but as I reached the top step he woke up. So I took him in the bathroom with me, and then we went into my room where I read a Hardy Boys mystery and Elijah sat beside me, looking in the mirror, until he fell asleep just sitting there. I laid him down and went out into the hall to intercept the other children as they woke up. They all played quietly in the boys’ room until Bob woke up, and then we went downstairs.

Elijah didn’t wake up until 8, but somehow we made it out of the house before 10, for the first time since moving to this house. We finally made up our minds to go south to the big waterfall, named Pistyll Rhaeadr. We stopped in Bala at Tegid lake, which has its own breed of fish, not found anywhere else. It’s also Wales’ largest natural lake. We eventually found a picnic area, and ate, threw rocks in the lake, and climbed trees. Taryn and Naysha now know how to skip rocks.
After lunch we went on to the waterfall, which was quite a harrowing drive down 4 miles of single lane road, but we made it. As we were unloading the car a bird with terrific aim dropped one right on Bob’s camera lens. No splatter onto Bob, or the camera body. As it was fresh, it wiped up rather easily. Then on to the fall, which was just a little climb. It was very pretty, and as it was on a public footpath there were no railings or rules. Bob got a few good pictures before his battery went dead and it started to rain. Back to the car!

On the way home we stopped at Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, which is a canal way up in the air. There is a nice walk along the canal from town to the aqueduct, and we walked it, but didn’t get our jackets and so were quite chilled. We picked the wrong side of the canal to walk down, as when we got to the aqueduct we found that our path ended, but the path on the other side went out on the bridge thing. But there was a trail down under the bridge and up the other side, so Bob was able to go out on the bridge with the older children. I was sensible enough to stay on firm ground. But as we were deliberating and taking pictures, Ella began to climb through the railings on the edge of the cliff. Some Italians on the other side of the water (about 5 feet wide) yelled to her to get back, and we looked up and called her back, where she began crying. They exclaimed “Mama Mia!” and we thanked them for being bold enough to interfere. Phew. On the way back to the bus we picked a few blackberries, which are just coming into season. Refreshing, but a little sour.

Just down the road was the town of LLangollen, where we decided to park and look for dinner. The shops were just closing as we arrived, so we didn’t buy any fudge, mugs, or lovespoons. We settled on a hotel/restaurant/pub. We were greeted right away, and they had tables for 8 and high chairs, so we settled in easily. The large TV was on Sports, so that was okay, too. Our waitress/barista was attentive, but the food was a LOOOOONG time coming. And it was less than impressive. The “garlic bread” was buttered and garlic-ed toasted hamburger buns. Riah’s fish sticks had 2 actual pieces of fish. And though 4 of us had large plates of chips, when we asked for ketchup we were given 4 little packets total. When we asked for more, we got 2. So anyway, we ate and almost got full. After dinner we went over to Spar grocery store (more like a convenience store in this town) and got some fruit and crisps. When we stopped to change diapers before buckling up, we noticed that Elijah’s belly was covered with red spots. Right. We’ll keep an eye on that. (By the way, Saturday when he had a fever, he cut a tooth. His fever was hit and miss through Sunday and Monday, and then went away completely.)

We finally made it home at almost 9pm, and crashed hard.