Back to London today on a comfy train. We’re both getting pretty worn out!
Did a bit of shopping – buying you a souvenir maybe!
Tomorrow, a day trip…
Category: Miscellaneous
Rhymes with ‘Baggins’
St Fagans National History Museum is a little like the ‘Old Sydney Town’ of Wales, which means it’s a open-air museum showcasing what life was like in Wales hundreds of years ago.
It’s broadly divided into two halves, one containing the farms and village buildings; the other the castle and gardens. The buildings are (mostly) original and have been moved there from all over Wales. It’s not restricted to one period or region, and there’s a large variety of buildings to explore (from houses to stores to working buildings). I particular liked a terrace house with six units that had been furnished for six eras from 1830 until 1985!
We found ten piglets in one of the farms! There were other animals (sheep, cows, ducks etc) as well. There’s also recreations going on (since most of the equipment still works) and shops sell period food.
The castle side included an old manor house (the top photo shows the other side) surrounded by beautiful gardens. We both found this side of the museum the best.
We didn’t see everything. It’s massive and would take many hours. It was quite hot today and we were both tired after several hours of exploring. It was siesta time!
But not before a stop at an amazing retro game store I randomly found on the Internet. It was loaded with stuff I may had bought if I didn’t worry about getting it home, but in the end I ended up adding the first (and last) Spectrum game to my collection:
That tape (which still loads!) is 29 years old 🙂
I asked the proprietor if he had any Zzap or Crash magazines (my holy grails) in stock. Incredibly he did, but burned them in a bonfire ~3 weeks ago because no one ever wanted them and he didn’t have the space. It almost brought a tear to my eye 🙂
Experienced!
We went and got all Dr Who-ey here today. It’s a celebration/museum dedicated to Doctor Who, here in Cardiff since the new version of the show is made here.
The ‘Experience’ starts off with an interactive adventure where you (as part of a group) help the Doctor defeat some time squids that have hijacked the Tardis. This includes light effects and 3D projections and moving floors and a lot of cute videos specially recorded by Peter Capaldi (as the Doctor). It would be fantastic for younger fans, but I thought the whole thing was pretty cute 🙂
Then comes the museum!
Three original Tardis console props! Dozens of costumes! Monsters! Daleks! K9! Bessie!!
I was gobsmacked, to use the local vernacular.
So many original props, in such great (or even not so great!) condition. It was remarkable to see in person icons of my childhood.
There were of course more props from new Who than the old series, but I was charmed nonetheless by the costumes especially (Karen Gillan is so skinny!)
Yes they had Pertwees costume. Ah, the feels 🙂
I could go on and on – did I mention the exhibit of original Achilleos art for the Target book covers? – but suffice to say the place was incredible and for me it may be the highlight of the trip!
The Doctor Who Experience is right next to Cardiff Bay, and right afterwards we went on a brief cruise.
This was a joke ‘reward’ for KLS since she’s ridden this with me first:
Amazingly, the cars on this wheel actually rotated about their vertical axis which I’ve never seen before. It was fun.
Since I’m now going to write a bunch of postcards, I’ll leave you with a shot of lunch…
