Thwarted for chips last night, we depart Cwmbran this morning and look for a greasy spoon cafe for breakfast. Well actually in the end we look for something a bit more highbrow and head for Ross on Wye, which sounds like it might be a bit posh or is that Hay On Wye? Once there, Ross not Hay, we find a nice little cafe but the breakfast still has all the hallmarks of greasy spoonism, so I guess that’s a result on all fronts.
They’ve predicted a cold snap and maybe they’re right for once because at home the heating comes on, all on its own. So it must be cold. I hope it’s not been doing that while we’ve been away. I give it a right lecture on the price of gas and eventually it goes off again in shame.
I have a committee meeting tonight which I’m not looking for to. The arguments have carried on spasmodically via email ever since the last meeting and predictably they are soon back at full throttle once the meeting commences. It all culminates with one of the argumentees walking out with less than half an hour on the clock. It doesn’t get any more exciting than this at the dog club. Funnily enough once they’ve gone everything continues apace, we get loads covered and finish on time at 9pm for the first time in the year I’ve been on the committee. Way to go.
(Monday 17th October)
Showing posts with label Cwmbran. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cwmbran. Show all posts
Monday, 17 October 2011
Saturday, 15 October 2011
The Housing Estates Of South Wales
This morning MD sits intently watching the glass box thing that I step into to have a shower, just like most people would watch TV. Strange dog.
We discover that our cottage is pitched on a (small) mountain between the two housing estates of Cwmbran and Pontypool. It’s still quite pleasant though.

We take a walk around an ex-reservoir, dating back to 1884, and then on our way back down we pass an about to be very disappointed fisherman on his way up to it.

We try to find an afternoon pub but they're all derelict and/or the type you’d find on a housing estate and/or full of distraught Welsh rugby fans still drowning their sorrows six hours on from defeat to France. Well apart from the one we went in last night but we’ll probably be back there tomorrow.

So, at least it means we resist temptation and get to stay AF, staying in at base camp with pasta and time to contemplate tomorrow.
(Saturday 15th October)
We discover that our cottage is pitched on a (small) mountain between the two housing estates of Cwmbran and Pontypool. It’s still quite pleasant though.
We take a walk around an ex-reservoir, dating back to 1884, and then on our way back down we pass an about to be very disappointed fisherman on his way up to it.
We try to find an afternoon pub but they're all derelict and/or the type you’d find on a housing estate and/or full of distraught Welsh rugby fans still drowning their sorrows six hours on from defeat to France. Well apart from the one we went in last night but we’ll probably be back there tomorrow.
So, at least it means we resist temptation and get to stay AF, staying in at base camp with pasta and time to contemplate tomorrow.
(Saturday 15th October)
Friday, 14 October 2011
Base Camp Cwmbran
We head off to base camp for our assault on Cardiff and get seriously delayed on the way. The A40 isn’t moving at all and has according to the traffic websites a three hour delay. So we detour through some very narrow lanes and eventually Abergavenny. At least we see the sights.
We are actually staying in Upper Cwmbran and our cottage resides on mountain road. I guess it’s going to be that unmarked one snaking steeply up the mountain. Yep.
It’s a nice cottage with a wonderful stone staircase with a polished wooden landing which makes an ideal launching pad for the dogs to plummet headlong down the stairs. Not for us at home I think, on H&S grounds. We have a choice of bedrooms, upstairs or down. We choose upstairs, perhaps for entertainment value.

Then we head off to the dog friendly Bush Inn. Our narrow lane, mountain road, is quite a scary experience to drive up or down, but it's a positively death defying experience to walk down when you meet something like a tractor coming along it, especially in the dark. The cottage supplies a torch, which is quite literally a life saver.
The Bush Inn maybe dog friendly but I think with a Rock n Roll band playing tonight its better if we stay outside. Good job we’re still having such tropical weather. They serve us homemade pizza, with proper Italian style dough, and beer from Caerphilly. Which isn’t bad although L prefers the wine.
(Friday 14th October)
We are actually staying in Upper Cwmbran and our cottage resides on mountain road. I guess it’s going to be that unmarked one snaking steeply up the mountain. Yep.
It’s a nice cottage with a wonderful stone staircase with a polished wooden landing which makes an ideal launching pad for the dogs to plummet headlong down the stairs. Not for us at home I think, on H&S grounds. We have a choice of bedrooms, upstairs or down. We choose upstairs, perhaps for entertainment value.
Then we head off to the dog friendly Bush Inn. Our narrow lane, mountain road, is quite a scary experience to drive up or down, but it's a positively death defying experience to walk down when you meet something like a tractor coming along it, especially in the dark. The cottage supplies a torch, which is quite literally a life saver.
The Bush Inn maybe dog friendly but I think with a Rock n Roll band playing tonight its better if we stay outside. Good job we’re still having such tropical weather. They serve us homemade pizza, with proper Italian style dough, and beer from Caerphilly. Which isn’t bad although L prefers the wine.
(Friday 14th October)
Thursday, 7 July 2011
An Odd Definition Of A Treat
Daughter has booked a coach from Stoke to Abersoch for her surfing weekend at the Wakestock Festival. Hey ho. So I leave home this morning at 6am to take Daughter and her friend to Hanley Bus Station. What is strange is that stowing away on the front seat is Son. L's simple explanation is that 'there’s a girl in Stoke'. Well I would hope there are plenty of girls in Stoke but I assume this is one specific one. I suppose poor students can't miss out on a free lift but it's a shame he couldn’t have had her over here, given he has an empty house.
In theory three excitable teenagers should have been a car driver’s nightmare but not at six am, they were all pretty much comatose most of the time. I drop the girls off right next to their bus bay and they promptly disappear off to find a McDonald's. So if they subsequently get lost, they’ve got no one to blame but themselves. Son had long since wandered off, killing time until it was late enough to text his lift. His parting words ‘God this is a depressing place’. Welcome to Stoke. Hope she’s worth it.
Commonsense and the fact that I find even a brisk walk painful after amassing fifteen bruises (approximately) in my bike fall yesterday, means I skip tonight’s final race of the Grand Prix series and support L instead. I think of asking her to push me round in a wheelchair but decide against it. At least this way the boys get a night out and a chance to bark at some runners.

L does well again, again knocking over a minute off last year’s time. All of which will give her a good overall placing in the series. Better than mine obviously, having skipped this race I won’t get a final placing at all. I do still claim my series t-shirt, which is disappointingly long sleeved, which means it won’t get worn until November at the earliest.
I must be anticipating a soonish return to fitness and form because I enter us for the Cardiff Half Marathon today. We are so cosmopolitan. Stoke one week, then Wolverhampton, Harrogate and Cardiff. Wherever next? St Neots, Morecambe, Birmingham... the list goes on.
Cardiff is just the sort of huge mass race madness we thrive on, with 15,000 entries last year. Despite the fact it appears to be all around the Cardiff Bay area and looks a bit like a larger version of the Notts 10, e.g. laps around Holme Pierrepont.
I even book us a cosy cottage near Cwmbran, so that we can make a weekend of it. L offers to treat me to the Leek Half by way of a thank you. She seems to have an odd definition of a treat.
(Thursday 7th July)
In theory three excitable teenagers should have been a car driver’s nightmare but not at six am, they were all pretty much comatose most of the time. I drop the girls off right next to their bus bay and they promptly disappear off to find a McDonald's. So if they subsequently get lost, they’ve got no one to blame but themselves. Son had long since wandered off, killing time until it was late enough to text his lift. His parting words ‘God this is a depressing place’. Welcome to Stoke. Hope she’s worth it.
Commonsense and the fact that I find even a brisk walk painful after amassing fifteen bruises (approximately) in my bike fall yesterday, means I skip tonight’s final race of the Grand Prix series and support L instead. I think of asking her to push me round in a wheelchair but decide against it. At least this way the boys get a night out and a chance to bark at some runners.

L does well again, again knocking over a minute off last year’s time. All of which will give her a good overall placing in the series. Better than mine obviously, having skipped this race I won’t get a final placing at all. I do still claim my series t-shirt, which is disappointingly long sleeved, which means it won’t get worn until November at the earliest.
I must be anticipating a soonish return to fitness and form because I enter us for the Cardiff Half Marathon today. We are so cosmopolitan. Stoke one week, then Wolverhampton, Harrogate and Cardiff. Wherever next? St Neots, Morecambe, Birmingham... the list goes on.
Cardiff is just the sort of huge mass race madness we thrive on, with 15,000 entries last year. Despite the fact it appears to be all around the Cardiff Bay area and looks a bit like a larger version of the Notts 10, e.g. laps around Holme Pierrepont.
I even book us a cosy cottage near Cwmbran, so that we can make a weekend of it. L offers to treat me to the Leek Half by way of a thank you. She seems to have an odd definition of a treat.
(Thursday 7th July)
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