Castles Culture and Log Cabins

So you want to get away from it all for a few days? somewhere peaceful tucked away in the woods where your alarm call is the birds twittering and the sun shining through the trees. Do I know of such a place? indeed I do and just a couple of miles north of St Clears in Carmarthenshire you can find Woodland Lodges.

A friendly family run site with log cabins that sleep from two up to groups of eight people, all the cabins have their own sauna which is a nice addition to what is essentially a base to explore South West Wales. Each cabin has all you need to self cater during your stay, shower or whirlpool bath, a fridge freezer an oven with grill, microwave, toaster and a television it's all there, everything is run on electricity so make sure you have a supply of pound coins, one warning the electric meter will whizz round like a whirling dervish if you spark up the sauna.

St Clears is split in two by the busy A40 which hurries the traffic westward to Pembroke Dock and by-passing the quiet little town which has some nice pubs and a couple of excellent prize winning butchers cum delicatessen where locally produced food can be obtained for cooking back at the cabin.

Heading south out of St Clears on the road to Pendine Sands and Laugharne the brown signs direct you to Dylan Thomas' Boathouse and the village of Laugharne with it's ghostly mediaeval castle on the estuary of the River Taf. It is reputed to be the fictional town of Llareggub and the inspiration behind the Thomas play 'Under Milk Wood'. It's other claim to fame is that actor Neil Morrissey loves the place so much he bought one of the pubs Browns Hotel which he sold in 2004 and still has an interest in other property nearby notably the exclusive Hurst House Hotel.

Laugharne has a plethora of pubs ironically three of them are within a stones throw of Temperance House but for good home cooked food try Greens restaurant by the car park, they offer organic local produce but beware if you are peckish between 3 and 6pm as rural Wales is shut.

You can find the grave of Dylan Thomas and his wife Caitlin in the churchyard, a simple white wooden cross is all that marks the great writers last resting place. Most pubs around St Clears and Laugharne have pictures of Thomas on the walls and they all claim he was a regular. Thomas spent most of the last four years of his short life in Laugharne not always sober and often quoted 'an alcoholic is someone you don't like who drinks as much as you'....no wonder most people assumed he drank himself to death.

Take a walk along the cliffs westward away from the castle up through wooded cliffs and the coast path will lead you along the shore until just before the quarry you cut back into Laugharne where you can walk through the churchyard and then down to The Boathouse where Dylan Thomas lived, now part tea rooms part museum it can be visited as long as you arrive well before 3pm. Just along from the Boathouse is Thomas' writing shed, if not the most expensive shed in Britain it certainly has the best view, this culture trail is well trodden in the summer months when American tourists swarm down to see the great mans house and writing shed so avoid the high season.

After a wander around Laugharne a visit to Pendine Sands is a must, the vast stretch of beach with firm solid sand where land speed records were made and broken in the twenties by Sir Malcolm Campbell and J.G Parry-Thomas. The Museum Of Speed on the beach houses 'Babs' the motor car with a massive 27 litre aero-engined car driven by John Parry-Thomas who was to lose his life on the sands when Babs drive chain broke at a speed of 170mph almost taking his head off. The car was buried in the sand after the accident but was recovered and restored and returned to action on the beach in the seventies. I wanted to open up the modest 1.6 litre 16v engine on my new Renault for a blast along the beach to see what it can do but unfortunately the beach is in MOD hands now and all motoring activities on Pendine Sands are strictly prohibited especially between the hours of 1500 and 1800.

On the way back take a drive to Llansteffan just a few miles south of Carmarthen and climb the steep hill to the castle high on the cliffs. Llansteffan Castle is magical for as many reasons as you care to make up and mercifully unlike in England it's free to enter and not blighted by those twin spoilsports health and safety. Climbing on the ramparts gives a fine view out over the Tywi estuary and makes a wonderful playground, if I had a sword and shield I'd have been running around the place for hours. At low tide you can walk down the zig-zag steps from the south of the castle to the beach below for a spot of beachcombing or a walk on the sand.

This part of Wales is full of spectacular walks, loads of pubs and restaurants and a very friendly welcome from the locals, try the Butchers Arms in St Clears it's on the way out of town on the Laugharne road you'll get good ale and food including real chips something that South Wales is particularly good at, none of your frozen rubbish here just good locally sourced produce and scenery to take your breath away.

Woodland Lodges can be found via http://www.hoseasons.co.uk/

Madeira, Cake and Beer

Following quickly on from walking Hadrians Wall which got our knees into hill mode we took ourselves off to Madeira, the intention of dividing the break into a few days walking and the rest loafing around in the sun drinking ice cold cerveza por favor.

Madeira sits to the north of the Canary Islands in the Atlantic and despite being created by a volcano is lush and beautiful with a vast array of flowers growing practically everywhere. You'll need strong knees and a head for heights on some on the paths that run alongside the levadas but the views will be a fair reward for the effort. A levada is a small channel sometimes made of concrete or in older levadas hewn straight out of the rock, these water channels bring water from the wetter northern part of the island to the drier sunny south where it's used to irrigate the banana plantations among other crops. These channels run for miles all over the island, providing water for hydro-electric plants as well as the other types of edible and floral plants.

If you are staying in Funchal where most of the hotels are situated it's possible to take the yellow town buses and get up pretty high, the buses are frequent and don't worry about missing your stop, when there are no locals left on board it's the end of the line and time to get off.

A good idea is to take along the "Sunflower" Madeira walking book by John and Pat Underwood, this has walks, maps local important advice and essential bus information, it's all you need to get yourself out into this beautiful islands most stunning areas.
You could hire a car but this is quite pricy on Madeira, buses are freely available as are taxis and with this mode you don't have to worry about getting back to where you left the hire car after your days walk.
There are several firms on the island which specialise in walking tours on Madeira and they will collect you from your hotel and take you in a mini bus to your start point and pick you up when you've finished, an experienced guide will take you on some breathtaking walks hopefully without a group of over-excited Americans.

We set off on our own for our first walk from Romeiros to Camacha, the route took us along the Levada dos Tornos passing two tea-houses on the way, my tip is to go for the Hortensia Tea Rooms where the cake is fantastic and a must have energy boost when walking all day. If you get time on this route use it to stop off at the beautiful gardens at Palheiro Ferreiro.
Along the way you'll pass wild geraniums, agapanthus, mimosa and eucalyptus trees among loads of other plants. The islanders make use of every bit of space for growing crops, you'll see runner beans, peas, cabbages, garlic and by one small house an enterprising local had left a bowl of ice filled with bottles of the excellent island beer "Coral", a bottle opener and a tin for the money, most welcome on a dry hot day. As far as equipment goes, you'll need your boots, day pack and a waterproof jacket as it can get a bit damp on top of the mountains and on the plateau. Leave your vertigo behind but you'll need to take a torch for walking on Madeira as a few of the levadas cut straight through the mountains and some tunnels can take ten minutes to walk through.

If you want to get further inland and higher up then one of the guided walk options is a good idea, the Pico Grande and Pico Ruivo are the highest points but some of the valleys are extremely beautiful and the walk from Rabacal (1500m) to the twenty-five fountains and back through the Curral Valley is especially nice although you will need a head for heights here as the path is only a foot wide in places. The fountains are morelike mountain springs but it's a lovely spot for a picnic and if you're lucky a chaffinch will help you eat it.The authorities have now gone a bit "health & safety" mad and all the dangerous areas have a grab wire alongside the path. You find yourself walking along paths which have so much vegetation alongside you don't even realise there is a sheer drop just metres away, you appreciate this when a viewpoint opens out and a sheer cliff is visible where you have just walked from on the other side of the mountain with a valley 100s of metres deep below your feet.

Madeira is a relatively safe place to holiday, the only danger being the odd insane taxi driver and as it has no beach or clubbing culture it's free from the lager lout element, in fact it's more "Saga Lout" with gangs of retired Brits and Germans in their uniform of beige and sky blue roaming the main strip looking for a meal deal or a bar with tv and football. Madeira is a fantastic place for a walking holiday but equally good if you just fancy lazing by the pool, beaches are not plentiful as this is a rocky volcanic island but lush gardens are, the Jardin Botanico above Funchal is a must see and if you make your way up to Monte the Tropical Garden at the Monte Palace is delightful. Along the coast from Funchal is Calheta which has a manufactured beach with golden sands shipped in from the Sahara but the best thing about Madeira for me is the mountains and the lazy levadas where you can walk for miles in total tranquility.

One of those days

We've all had them, one of those days when not everything goes wrong but pretty close to it. Major things occur during the day that seem like the end of the world, things that could cause your blood pressure to rise and your chest pump with rage, unless like me you can learn to cope with these unexpected occurances that are out of your control.
Okay so that last bit isn't quite true, I am probably the least tolerant and most unable person to cope with the unexpected. If a plane, train or bus is scheduled to leave at a certain time then to my mind there is no reason for it not to do so. How can it be so difficult?

Having had a fantastic week on the island of Madeira we had breakfast in the hotel and checked out after refusing to pay €14.60 for phone calls we hadn't made and found our taxi driver was waiting to take us on the twenty-five minute ride to Funchal airport. His yellow Mercedes was draped in Benfica flags and a minor shrine to the Blessed Virgin on the dashboard. This portly moustache wielding latter day highwayman then set off into the Madeiran rush hour only using his brakes as a last resort. The speed we hit on the busy expressway was now getting serious, the needle hit 150kmh (an unhealthy 95mph) and exiting a tunnel onto a high level viaduct the car suddenly started weaving and snaking at high speed, "senor...SENOR, por favor SLOW DOWN", he did but only for a couple of kilometres, and my next utterance (after much swearing) was "he's got no chance of a tip".

Thankfully the Virgin Mary was looking after us and we got to the airport alive, SuperMario went off to get us a trolley which we didn't need "he's still not getting a tip" and then asked for €32.30. Now then, I'd booked it and the agreed price was €30, I know it's only €2.30 difference but stay with me here, it's the principle of the thing. I did a deal for thirty bucks which is more than enough for what proved to be a ten minute ride, you can hire a cab for half a day for forty euros! So me and this big moustache argued over who was right and when I called a policeman to my assistance he quickly weighed it up, on one hand a taxi driver sporting a giant rug on his top lip and an extremely irate soon to be departing tourist. His response was to ignore the whole incident and walk away, cheers mate thanks a bunch, so in my worst Portuguese I told the driver my thoughts of him and waited for my seventy cents change.

I was in a fit of rage, my girlfriend all the time telling me to forget it and calm down, wise words but I wasn't listening I was so incensed I forgot that he'd nearly killed us. Moving into the airport the next thing I see is our flight is no longer 1115 but 1225, "oh well, lets check in anyway" but oh no, easyjet have other ideas, so an hour later we get checked in and find that the flight is now set to leave at 1300. At last we're going to board the plane but at quarter past two we're on but being told to get off and wait in the lounge in the terminal while a gang of moustachios sort out a technical problem. Oh well, I didn't want to see the Turkey v Germany game anyway.

Needless to say I took this in my stride and calmly left the aircraft for the terminal, I had a great seat too, would I get the legroom I craved when we reboard? if we reboard. Being held in a limbo world between duty free and the aircraft my frayed nerves had to contend with screaming children and those who hold "speedy boarding" tickets. If you want a better class of travel you don't fly easyjet, if you want to get somewhere sunny for £80 return you do fly easyjet and take all the scrummaging that goes with it Those mugs who pay the extra just to get on first so that they can read their Daily Mails by the window, remember this, I always get on pretty early, get the most legroom and don't pay a penny more than when I bought the ticket.

So after cruising up and down Funchals runway to see if the new landing gear circuit board from the local Tandy shop is working the plane finally got away and back to Gatwick, a train journey back to Fratton and rushing over the footbridge to Smiffys Sports Bar on Goldsmith Avenue we ordered beer but they only had Fosters and settled in to watch the rest of Turkey v Germany.
All was not well, no picture which thankfully meant no Motson but the radio was on which meant Alan Green, just how bad could this day get? Soon answered, Germany go 2-1 ahead, pictures return and we see Turkey come back to two each but even as I was cheering the Turks and looking forward to extra time the Germans joined in the conspiracy and scored a third to book their place in the final of 2008s European Championship.

Never mind, I've learnt from the experiences of that day and whatever happens to you in "one of those days", you'll look back and think it wasn't that bad after all, nobody died and remember, there's always someone worse off than yourself, the awful scenes on the news from Zimbabwe reminded me of that.

Observing the Rules

Brussels, what does the name mean to you? is it a cosmopolitan city in Belgium or does it mean Europe and the handing down of rules and regulations that only us British seem to impose and observe?

"Welcome to Smoke-Free Brussels" proclaimed the sign in the Eurostar terminal and again in the Marriot Hotel near the Grand Place. But somewhere along the line the bars have managed to evade this rule, every bar I visited (and they were numerous) during my three day trip was full of smokers. Now, I have been a smoker but managed to kick the vile habit in the year 2000.
I was at Cheltenham Racecourse and had bought sixty Lucky Strikes for the three day trip, found slumped under the statue of Dawn Run with acute loss of legs and speech, I had smoked all three packets in one day which also means I had drunk more than the recommended two months units of alchohol for an adult male in a single day.
I recovered slowly and after five days I realised I hadn't had a cigarette since Cheltenham, I surmised then that I obviously didn't need to smoke and from that day on I have (thankfully) found the whole smoking thing very unpalatable.

There's nothing worse than a reformed smoker so I've been told but if you've seen the light and are a much healthier and wealthier person for it then you shout it from the rooftops. I have some very dear friends who I constantly bully for their smoking, I don't know if it helps them or if it just makes them do it all the more?

The smoking ban in England has been welcomed and abhorred by thousands, pubs are now cleaner fresher smelling places but the outside areas are no-go zones for a non-smoker, why didn't the government give pubs the choice? It wasn't a ruling handed down by Brussels but the government went for it wholeheartedly and in the same old knee jerk reaction as if it was a european parliament decree. The pubs I use always tended to have less smokers than non, I wouldn't choose to go into a backstreet local or a working mens club and I doubt the regulars in there would want me to anyway, but give them the choice. Those pubs and clubs have a majority of smokers among their clientele, they're not normally well known for being food pubs so where's the problem? Let the smoky pubs continue and let those that don't rely on the smokers to be pleasantly smoke free.

Brussels does have smokeless zones in some bars but most are full on, smoke where you like and I have to say it was pretty nasty, after months of enjoying smoke-free establishments in England it came as a shock, the smoke drifting upstairs in one jazz cafe was too much for me to bear, so too in the trendy but old world Cafe Cirio when the man on the next table pulled out a foot long Montecristo and proceeded to ignite it, that was the final straw. I don't suppose this country will ever become like our continental chums who enjoy a pavement table, any outside seating area I see in England is occupied by smokers, so come spring and summer will I be forced to drink inside? There are many favourite boozers of mine that have outside areas to enjoy, living on the south coast the views from some pubs are a real joy but I fear that sitting outside one will not be the pleasurable experience it once was.

Brussels is also home to some of Europes worst drivers, on Saturday the 5th of January the police held an operation to target drink drivers and an astounding one in ten of those stopped were over the limit. Mind you if you popped in for a beer on the way home from work in Belgium and that beer was an 8.4% abv Duvel, you'd be significantly over the limit.
I enjoyed my Brussels experience very much, I wouldn't want to drive in the city though, just crossing the road on foot is a mission that requires careful planning and tactics especially if you've been on a bar crawl, the little green man lights up and off you go only to have a car come flying into your path, a stressful place and it's no wonder all the locals smoke.

I'll be returning to Belgium soon, Eurostar is the future, what a civilised way to travel without the security nightmare of Heathrow and none of the drag of a trek to Dover to catch a ferry with your car which will probably get rammed by a ten year old BMW the moment you fail to spot the traffic lights have turned green.