March 1st - St David's Day

 The flag of Wales has the symbol of the red dragon against green and white.

March 1st is St David's Day. St David is the patron saint of Wales.

Prince William, the Prince of Wales, and his wife Kate, Princess of Wales, visited Wales, held yellow daffodils, the national flower, and spoke in Welsh.

In Wales

A parade of people dressed as dragons or wearing Welsh costume, is held in the capital, Cardiff.

The day is celebrated in Wales by people wearing daffodils, or leeks. Eating Welsh cakes - which are like think small pancakes or thin scones, yummy when served hot with butter melting on top.

What to do in Wales? 

1 Visit castles. Stay in a castle hotel or a hotel with a view of the castle. 

2 Eat Welsh food. Lamb and Welsh cakes. 

3 Visit Museums In Wales.

4 Learn Welsh. Start with words on trains from Paddington, in London, to Cardiff. Notice signs on stations. Learn Welsh on Duolingo.

5 Hear Welsh music. Welsh male voice choirs, singing in Welsh and English. Harpists who also sing. Esteddfod festivals.

Visits

Welsh museums 

My favourites are 

1 The Roman Museum near Caerleon. 

2 The tapestry in the library at Fishguard.

3 The free museum in Cardiff, the capital.

In summer you might visit an open air museum, go down a mine. 

Trails

Dylan Thomas

Fun Photos In Wales

Castles. 

Yourself and a castle. 

Yourself wearing a Welsh hat.

Souvenirs Of Wales To Buy Before Returning Home

You might buy Welsh souvenirs such as 

1 Carved love spoons. 

2 Welsh dragon or flag symbol 

On tee shirts or aprons or tea towels.

3 Welsh Words

I bought a book on Welsh words in a supermarket. 

4 Welsh Cakes

I bought Welsh cakes on the train home to London from Wales, but ate them cold which was not as nice. I should have saved them for later and heated them up.

Welsh Music

Land of my fathers

Men of Harlech 

Calon Lan (sung at Rugby matches)

Welsh Male Voice Choirs.

Solo artists such as Sir Tom Jones - singing Green Green Grass of Home). Dame Shirley Bassey.

Recordings sold in souvenir shops.

Welsh Food and Drink

1 Welsh cakes containing currants or dried fruit

2 Bara brith - speckled bread, a fruit cake

3 Lava bread (seaweed)

4 Lamb Casserole, with vegetables, (called cawl)

5 Leeks

Factory tours and tasting shops

Beer

Honey

Whisky

Wine

Words in Welsh-English

Dewi Sant - saint David (adjective second after the noun, like Spanish and French)

Do the little things in life. (Quote from St David.)

gwnewch y pethau bychain

 Wales: "Penblwydd hapus i chi    Happy birthday to you

Words in English - Welsh

Do the little things in life = gwnewch y pethau bychain

Happy birthday to you -   Wales: "Penblwydd hapus i chi

Welsh Words - English

aber - estuary

allanfa - exit 

bara brith - speckled bread bara-bread brith-speckled

bore - morning

bws - bus

car - car

cath - cat

croeso - welcome

diolch - thanks

eglwys - church

fach - small

felin - mill

fferi - ferry

llan - church

mawr - big (I think of more or magnificent)

o - of

plas - mansion (not just a place, a mansion)

pont - bridge

toiled - toilet

toiledau dynion - men's toilets

toiledau merched - ladies toilets

twr - tower

tywel - towel

y - the

English - Welsh

A- D

big - mawr (I think of more or magnificent)

bridge - pont

bus - bws 

car - car

cat - cath

church - eglwys / Llan

E - K

estuary - aber

exit - allanfa

ferry - fferi

good - da

Good morning.

Bore da. (BOR-eh dah) (The adjective is after the noun, literally morning good.)

Good night.

Nos da. (NOHS dah)

L - R

mill - felin

 morning - bore

mansion - plas  (not just a place, a mansion of - o

S - Z

small - fach the - y

toiledau dynion - men's toilets

toiledau merched - ladies toilets

tower - twr 

towel - tywel 

toilet - toiled

welcome - croeso 

Useful Websites On Welsh Souvenirs and Subjects

Languages

duolingo.com

https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Welsh_phrasebook

translate google

Saint David - Dewi Sant

Dylan Thomas

Useful Websites About Wales and St David's Day

Report of the royal visit on Sunday March 1st 2026

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c70n99e396jo

Music

https://tirglas.co.uk/pages/portal-famous-welsh-songs-and-anthems

Calon Lan hymn

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calon_L%C3%A2n

We Are Still Here recording in Welsh, solo with chorus

https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0179/9045/files/21_-_Yma_O_Hyd.mp3?v=1654767520

Please follow my blogs and share links to your favourite posts.

For A Warm Welcome in Wales - Drive West - Cardiff Castle, Welsh cakes, whisky, wine and wooden spoons

 

A Weekend Or Week In Wales

Drive west our of London, past Heathrow. on the M4 motorway, past Reading on your right, Windsor on your left, and across a wonderful bridge into Wales.

Padding Station's Bear and Brunel

Or you could take the train from Paddington station, stopping to see the station's statue of Paddington Bear. Then see the seated statue of Brunel. He built the railway out West, tunnels, big bridges, and finally the big ship taking travellers further west America.

On the road you will see signs in Welsh, Croiso, which means welcome. The train has bilingual signs, and the stations as you come into Wales also have bilingual signs.

The train takes you to the Welsh capital, Cardiff. You will rcognize the Welsh flag, of the red dragon against a green background.

Cardiff is a great city, with a great castle, and a big free museum. Castles and impressive castle ruins make greaaat photo opportunities and walks along the coasts. 

Welsh delicacies, include the dessert dishes, Welcsh cakes which I bought on the train home. I should have waited until I reached home, Small fat panckes with raisins, best when you heat them up with melted butter. Wales is also known for whisky and wine, weaving, and wooden spoon carving.

Old Wales

Just across the border, a drive over the hill to your right, is Caerleon, with its Roman Museum.

Along the coast is the Dylan Thomas area. If you drive on, or stay on the train to the end of the railway line, you reach Fishguard, where the ferry will take you on to Ireland. The west is wet, with rain on the hills of Wales, where you see white sheep contasting with the green greass in summer, Welsh lamp on the menus of restaurants, bed and breakfast places, and histotoric hotels. You might recall the name of the book, How Green was my valley. 

New Wales

What's new in Wales? A football museum in Wrexham opening in 2026. If you are planning ahead, you have time to learn a few words of Welsh, with the help of Duolingo.

Here are some signs you may see

Welsh Words - English

aber - estuary

allanfa - exit 

bore - morning

bws - bus

car - car

cath - cat

croeso - welcome

eglwys - church

fach - small

felin - mill

fferi - ferry

llan - church

mawr - big (I think of more or magnificent)

o - of

plas - mansion (not just a place, a mansion)

pont - bridge

toiled - toilet

toiledau dynion - men's toilets

toiledau merched - ladies toilets

twr - tower

tywel - towel

y - the

English - Welsh

Good morning.

Bore da. (BOR-eh dah) (The adjective is after the noun, literally morning good.)

Good night.

Nos da. (NOHS dah)

Useful Websites 

Languages

duolingo.com

https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Welsh_phrasebook

translate google

Wales - St David's Day on March 1st And Dylan Thomas Every Day, with Welsh cakes

 I celebrated by wearing yellow.

 March 1st every year is St David's Day in Wales. Not yet a national holiday but lots of people voted for it to be a national holiday, even if they had to sacrifice a different day to replace it by St David's Day.

The colour is yellow, for the yellow of the Daffodil. 

However, the flag of Wales is green, and white with a red dragon. 

This was the flag of the first Tudor King, Henry VII, who preceded the more famous Henry VIII of the 6 wives.

I wore yellow, green, white and red, mostly yellow and green.

I hunted all over the web for yellow, then decided to check my own wardrobe. 

Yellow Wrap 'Dress'

I had a yellow wrap dressing gown. I never wear it because it is too long. Time to stop leaving it hanging up doing nothing. Time to start thinking, live every day as if it were your last. 

I am also getting more ruthless about taking out the scissors and altering clothes to fit whatever my size is now. I could not go out in the garment. It would get dirty, and trip me up. I was not even comfortable wearing it around the house. I had been saving it for years. I thought, I could cut it tomorrow. Find something else now. 

On second thoughts, cut it now. But I needed time to cut it straight, room to lay it on the floor. Or a friend to help me. 

Nope. If I folded it edge to edge twice, I could be sure it would not go diagonally. At worst, I would have it scalloped. I folded it and snipped one side, a few inches above my ankles. 

When I finished cutting, it was much better. I could walk in it. I considered making it edge to edge, maybe with a zip. No time. I tied it wrap around. I could use the off-cut around the waist as a wide cummerbund to conceal the wrap-over effect and keep it tight and neat. However, I wanted it for a zoom meeting. Most of the time I would be sitting down. 

The off-cut made a scarf. How about ear-rings?

I added DIY yellow and green balloon pattern ear-rings and a red balloon on my headband.

Who are the Welsh heroes? First and foremost, Dylan Thomas. His poem, 'Do not go gentle into that good night' is a favourite for condolences and obituary.

.And funerals.

Also from his classic longer poetic work, Under Milk Wood, I like to quote.

It is spring, moonless night in the small town, starless and bible-black, the cobblestreets silent and the hunched, courters'-and-rabbits' wood limping invisible down to the sloeblack, slow, black, crowblack, fishingboat-bobbing sea. The houses are blind as moles (though moles see fine tonight in the snouting, velvet dingles) or blind as Captain Cat there in the muffled middle by the pump and the town clock, the shops in mourning, the Welfare Hall in widows' weeds. And all the people of the lulled and dumbfound town are sleeping now.

Dylan Thomas statue, Swansea, Wales.

What could we eat on St David's day, and any day? Welsh rarebit (toast with cheese) for breakfast. Maybe Welsh lamb for lunch. And Welsh cakes at tea time. I bought some on the train from Paddington station in London to Wales, and on the way back. But they were cold. Much better eaten hot with melted butter. They are small round pancakes, thick, with currants. Yummy.

In New York you can visit the pub he visited.

St David's day has gone. But -

Every day is a good day for quoting Dylan Thomas. Every day is a good day for eating Welsh cakes.

Useful Websites

https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Dylan_Thomas

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_cake

Author

Angela Lansbury

Elizabeth Taylor, Moby Dick and Fishguard Bay Hotel

Liz Taylor, centre, Richard Burton, right. Photo from bar of Fishguard Bay hotel.

Fishguard Bay Hotel is up on the cliff above the end of the train line where passengers are brought by train to catch the ferry from Wales to Ireland.

The hotel overlooks the bay where Moby Dick was filmed.

Film stars who stayed at the hotel were Richard Burton, Peter O'Toole and entourage. Liz Taylor was also in the film of Under Milk Wood by Welsh poet Dylan Thomas.

The framed report of their stay is in the hotel bar, which says that the magic bedrooms were number 123 and 124. I am in some doubt as to whether Liz Taylor stayed on the hotel.

Rooms 123 and 124 are suites, larger rooms. They were occupied when I was there. Next time I visit the hotel I shall take a photo for you to see.

Another place open to the public featuring the story is down in the town.

Above the end of the railway line is the clifftop hotel, with a view.

Regarding the hotel, it is old fashioned, the best of Britain as it used to be. Solid food, meat and two vegetables, usually including potatoes.

Dessert options on my three day stay included Banoffee (banana and toffee) pie, chocolate cake, apple tart and fruit salad. (Three choices per set meal.)

Cooked breakfast included baked beans, hash brownies (grated potato fried), brown or white bread, sachets of marmalade or strawberry or black currant jam. Vegetarian sausages on request.

Old fashioned in what way? Free-standing wardrobes.

The staff are lovely, can't do enough for you.


Fishguard Bay Hotel and the bay, Wales. Photo taken and edited by Angela Lansbury.

The View
You can see the sea from the terrace in front of the hotel, the windows of the bar and the window side of the restaurant, and the front bedrooms.

About the Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer. Author of Quick Quotations.
Please share links to your favourite posts.

Fred Keenor, Welsh and British Hero of Football and Two World Wars - plus Liz Taylor and more about what to see in Wales

Statue of Welsh Foodball player, Keenor, in front of Cardiff Stadium, Wales, UK

I had never heard of Fred Keenor when I read that his statue had been placed outside Cardiff Stadium in Wales. Keenor was a keen football player who was one of eleven children and so poor that they could not not afford a football but played with tennis balls and bunches of rags. As a child he shared a room in a typical Welsh terraced house with three others in the bedroom, no electricity and an outside toilet.

However, despite all his disadvantages, his enthusiasm for football inspired others and the team he played in reached first division.
Wartime Trials
In World War II he was at the battle of the infamous and relentless battle of the Somme, in trenches filled with rats and raining shrapnel. His leg was so badly injured that doctors considered amputating it.
After the war he married and had seven children.

WWII
World War two when he was too old to be at the front lines brought no respire. Two of his sons were killed and after the war he travelled to France to see where one of his sons had been shot down.
he developed diabetes. Throughout his life he and his wife continued to work and literally feed themselves and others, growing vegetables and raising poultry to sell at Christmas. Alas his wife died when there was a gas leak and he was lucky to survive it.

I can relate to this. We had gas smells for years in my house. We were told that it was just the Years  flue. Years later we called the gas company again. this time the gas pipe was re-routed outside the house instead of along the inside. I have pictures of our garden dug up by the gas company.
later in life he continued working despite the problems with his diabetes, at one point walking five miles to work - with a leg severely injured in WWI.

Keenor's surviving sons included two who went on in the football world.
Truly a remarkable character with an extraodinary life.

If you are passing though Cardiff and go to reflect on the determination of this man to work and play and make the best of life.


What else is there to see in Wales for a tourist? Sites associated with Dylan Thomas, a whole trail, not just the boathouse where he lived with his wife. If you take the train to Wales from Paddington, London, on Paddington station you will see the statue on the station of Brunel who built the railway, the Clifton Suspension Bridge, and railway right across Wales to the port where the ship he built linked Britain and Europe to the USA.

What To See And Do In Wales
The final stop of that section of the railway is Fishguard Bay where you can catch a boat across to Ireland, or stay at the clifftop Fishguard Bay Hotel and read about how Liz Taylor and Richard Burton appeared in movies filmed here, such as Moby Dick and Dylan's Thomas's Under Milk Wood.

Poster of Liz Taylor and Richard Burton and Peter O'Toole in Under Milk Wood, by Dylan Thomas.

Every February a writers' Holiday takes places in the hotel. Arrive early for breakfast or dinner if you want to get a romantic window seat at a table for two overlooking the bay.

Fishguard Bay Hotel. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

If you drive, you will see Welsh bilingual signs on the road and plaques about local history. If you take the train you will see bilingual signs in English and Welsh on the stations. Wales is a wonderful green break, with white sheep on the green hillsides in Springtime. Train fares vary according to season and you can reduce the price by booking early, changing your day of travel or taking time to shop around and taking a different route and seeing even more of this cute little country. It's the land of legends, the red dragon on the flag,

Welsh cakes, if you buy them on the train, cold, save them until you get home. They are half way between a pancake and a scone, delicious served hot or warm with melting butter.

Which Welsh characters do you already know? You might know Dylan Thomas the poet, Richard Burton the actor, Katherine Zeta-Jones the actress, singers such as Jones.

Another feature of Wales is the male voice choirs. But Wales is not all about men and mining and football. In Fishguard you can see the long embroidery featuring the indominatable Welsh ladies in red dressed and black hats who captured the invading French soldiers a few hundred years back.

Useful Websites
Wikipedia, Wikivoyage, Wikitravel, Tripadvisor, Welsh Tourist Board, Cardiff Tourist Board
Fishguard Bay. Fishguard Bay Hotel, Writers Holiday. Duolingo to learn Welsh. You will see

Wales
About the Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer. I have many more posts, on Fishguard, Brunel, Wales, learning languages, the UK and the world. Please share links to your favourite posts.

Wonderful Wales: Fishguard's Last Invasion Tapestry, Elizabeth Taylor's Hotel, Honey, bugs and more

Welsh Dragon

Fishguard
The two big attractions, outdoors and indoors.

Indoors
The Last Invasion Embroidery
On the main square in Fishgaurd is the Town Hall contianing the tourist office with leflats and souvenirs on the ground floor, and the library with the gallery displaying the embrodiery, Wales' answer to the Bayeux tapestry.

The Last Invasion, written in text and pcitures on a long cloth like a cartoon, with colour and humour, tells the local story of how the women in red and black outfits and high hats, scared off the invading French and captured them. (Sort of reverse Bayeux tapestry, because in the Bayeux tapestry the invading French won, under William the Conqueror. He told his story, and gave us the valuable historic Domesday book, but is still remembered as the anti-hero in Hastings.

The Under Milk Wood Trail
Dylan Thomes wrote Under Milk Wood based on two places in Wales you can visit. However, many people are equally or more familiar with the places in Fishguard shown in the film starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. You can walk around the upper town, near the Town Hall and Embrodiery, then walk down or bus down to Lower Fishguard, walk along past the boats and tiny hosues, admiring the sculptures.

Sit by the sea on the benches and shelter your sandwiches from marauding seagulls which hop hopefull towards your feet, hoping from crumbs or donations. Then pop into the pub for a drink and read the cuttings and pictures and posters on the walls.  Plenty of photo opportunities, you against the sea, or the parked boats, or the wave of boats as a backdrop.

Other Wishlist Places Around Wales
Bug Farm
Has a Grub Kitchen, tel 07986 698169.
14.5 miles from Fishguard and 17 miles from Haverfordwest.
Glass
Honey
Winery

Fishguard Bay Hotel. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Up on the clifftop above the Fishguard and Goodwyck station is the Fishguard Bay Hotel where Liz and Richard stayed whilst filming. Enjoy the fine view.

One of the bedrooms was where they stayed. The hotel has a honeymoon suite.

Much of the building is, by accident rather than design, stuck in a time warp. All the more delightful.

This is the real thing. Old Wales. It's windy, wet and miles away. (From London.)  Love it or hate it. I love it.

Useful Websites
facebook.com.GWRUK
www.thebugfarm.co.uk

More later.

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. Please share links to your favourite posts. 

What Would You Want From Cardiff Airport Development? Read My Exciting Ideas

CROESO - Welcome

I've never been to Cardiff airport. I didn't even know they had an airport. It's not in Cardiff, airports normally aren't - you occasionally get helicopters alanding in cities but mostly airports are outside.

Cardiff Airport is about 30 minutes away from the city centre. Every twenty minutes the Cardiff Airport Express bus sets off from the airport to the city centre.

If you are travelling by car, on the M4 from London, or further into Wales, it is 13 miles from Junction 33. The area is the Vale of Glamorgan.

Cardiff from the train. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

I take the train through Cardiff about twice a year (into Wales and out), and have done for at least ten years.

To get me to visit Cardiff airport from London, paying for a flight, would mean I would need
1 quick check-in with hand baggage; cheaper price than the train from Paddington.

However, many people do fly in, about a million a year. From Cardiff Airport you can connect by direct flight to Dublin and many other cities for a city break. It's not all hops. Their website tells you that you can also do an indirect flight with a stopover, going on to as far away as the Middle East, and Malaysia.

I would like to see an Aviation Museum with quizzes; some interactive activities on a Welsh theme with a huge model of Wales and lots of photos and quotations and life stories of Welsh people such as Dylan Thomas. Add signs to transport to attractions all over Wales. Show photos of events involving the airport: NATO Wales Summit, Rugby World Cup and UEFA Champions League final. (UEFA stand for Union of European Football Associations.)

Conference Centre
I would like to see a conference center at the airport, part of the big hotel or beside it. The conference centre could be underground, like the conference centre I went to at a hotel in Brighton, England.

Changi airport, Singapore, is full of flowering plants. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Changi's Award-Winning Attractions
The airport could be a kind of theme park. Go and look at the website of Changi airport's current terminals (which include a butterfly garden). The butterfly garden is stunning. Giant butterflies are attracted to huge cut tree stamps. Detailed descriptions explain everything you would like to know about butterflies.

Butterfly Garden at Changi Airport. See Wikipedia.

Changi Airport terminal building with indoor gardens. From Wikipedia.

The plan for Changi airport's next terminal.

A proposed new Changi terminal includes a giant fountain and waterfall. I've seen the outside started, as I drive past.

In Cardiff, build at least two storeys underground to make more space; and a safe refuge area - with an escape tunnel.

Airport Hotel Or Hotels!
The Draft Masterplan says the Cardiff development organizers are considering building a hotel, implying just one hotel.

However, Wales on line talks about a four-star hotel plus a budget hotel, which sounds a better option, pleasing more passengers.

My view is, don't just have one hotel, but two or three, at different prices. Better still, six types of accommodation, 1 to 5 star. Also have short term bunks, like the Japanese hotels, with alarms for people who want to sleep, rest, or hide away and shut eyes with their belongings secure, between flights.

Activities
Have a masterplan of connections with other airports so that people can plan a two centre holiday, staying at both airports in the airport hotels.

Run a Welsh language course at the airport, or even a three hour or one day course for business people, those relocating, or a weekend away.

Have an underground garden of things which can grow in the dark, such as mushrooms and potatoes, and serve them in the restaurants or export them freshly picked on flights to other countries, or as Welsh airline meals. Plus leeks.

How about a mascot, the flying sheep.

Welsh Music
I would hope to hear some recordings of Welsh music.
A Welsh male voice choir.
A Welsh harp.

This lady performed at Writers' Holiday in Fishguard, Wales, where I have seen her several years running.

I would like to hear a specially commissioned Welsh song - in English and Welsh so everybody can sing along. Something along the lines of Men of Harlech, Que Viva Espana or Take me back to Sorrento.

Bilingual Signs
I'm delighted to hear that all the signs are bilingual. The same applies to the motorway signs and the railway station signs. Before you reach your destination, as soon as the train or car crosses the border, you start to see the Welsh words. You think: I'm in another country, another language, I'm on holiday!

Welsh Food
See my posts on destinations in Wales, Welsh food and drink, learning the Welsh language. Please share links to your favourite posts.
Wales has Welsh cakes.

Welsh cake. Photo by Angela Lansbury.

Welsh cake with butter. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Welsh Drink
Wales has wine and whisky.



















Penderyn whisky Distillery, Wales. Photo supplied by the Distillery. (I met the people who run it at an educational slide show at a wine and food show in Singapore.)

I've driven to Wales, I've taken the train from Paddington to Wales. Maybe it's time I took a flying visit.

What to See in Cardiff
Cardiff Castle.
Cardiff Museum - free!

Elsewhere around Wales -
If the Cardiff airport is not only a connection to Cardiff, but the gateway to Wales, you have lots to see. The Dylan Thomas boathouse and Dylan Thomas trails.

Fishguard's embroidery of the Last Invasion of Wales is fascinating. (A few feisty Welsh women in high black hats frightened off the French soldiers.)

Onward Train Connections
Heathrow and Changi airport both have underground railways into the capital city centre. Cardiff should have the same.

Instead of competing with the trains, the airlines and trains should co-operate on combined tickets. You could even do the travel equivalent of a triathlon. Fly into Cardiff. See Cardiff.

Take the train to Fishguard. See Fishguard.

Stay overnight at the old Fishguard Bay Hotel, where Liz Taylor and Richard Burton stayed, filming Moby Dick and Under Milk Wood.

Take the ferry from Fishguard to Ireland.

Bilingual sign on Cardiff Central railway station.

A million people fly into Cardiff, Wales. Now you know why.

Useful Websites
cardiff-airport.com
https://www.walesonline.co.uk/business/business-news/plans-new-hotels-cardiff-airport
http://www.changiairport.com/en/airport-experience/explore-changi/things-to-do-articles.html#recommend-4 (Shows the butterfly garden and giant sculpture and flower arrangements.)
visitwales.com
visitbritain.com
visitcardiff.com
http://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com/2018/04/where-to-find-welsh-whisky-and.html
www.nationaltrust.org.uk/days-out/regionwales/wales
https://www.duolingo.com/course/cy/en/Learn-Welsh-Online

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.

Museums About writers in America, Ireland and England

CHICAGO USA
https://americanwritersmuseum.org/visit/ 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Writers_Museum

DUBLIN, EIRE
https://www.dublinpass.com/dublin-attractions/dublin-writers-museum.html

Britain has many museums devoted to particular authors. For example
England
Shakespeare - Stratford upon Avon
Jane Austen - Bath
The Brontes - Haworth, Yorkshire

Wales
Dylan Thomas boathouse (Two Thomas trails)
Fishguard (Scene of films Under Milk Wood and Moby Dick) See my previous posts on Fishguard.

Scotland
Robbie Burns House, Ayr

visitbritain.com

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker

Welsh Names To recognize in history, geography, novels, or writing your novels

Flag of Wales, with the red Welsh dragon.

Problem
How do I recognize a Welsh name, when reading history?
How do I find a Welsh name for a character in a novel?
Where would I see Welsh names?
When would I need a Welsh name?

Answers
Check the list below. You will see Welsh names amongst authors, composers, poets, politicians, singers, writers and many more. Welsh names pop up in books and plays, and films (movies), and advertisements on cars and shop signs in Wales.
You might need a Welsh name for a character in a book, or a comedy sketch. (A Welsh accent is distinctive and can be used to differentiate one character from another. Famous characters you might wish to quote or perform on stage: Richard Burton, actor, Dylan Thomas and his poems, singer Tom Jones.)

Welsh First Names

Female  Welsh First names
Megan -

Male Welsh First Names
I have included names which come to mind. They may be Welsh, or of Welsh origin, or copied from somebody else living nearby or at the time.

Arthur
Dylan (as in Dylan Thomas, poet, author of Under Milk Wood)
Elgar (as in the composer)
Elvis (as in Elvis Presley)
Ffloyd (as in Pink Floyd band - notice the double f)
Gareth
Garth (as in Garth Brooks, country singer)
Harry (or Harri - as in Harri-son Ford)
Iago (as in the Shakespeare character in Othello)
Luc
Owain
Owen
Rhys
Steffan
Trebor (as in Mints)
Trevor (means village)
Trystan (as in the classic story of lovers)
Tudor (as in the Tudors on the English throne)
Vaughan
Winston (as in Winston Churchill)
Wyn

Surnames
Bevan
Bryce (as in Bruce Canyon in the USA)
Bunyan (as in the writer of Pilgrim's Progress)
Cecil
Cogan
Conway
Davies (son of David)
Dewey (as in the Dewey system for classifying books in libraries)
Evans (as in the department store you see in England, D H Evans)
Harris (like in Harris tweed, and island of Harris - see Wikipedia)
Hopkins (as in the poet Gerald Manley Hopkins)
Hughes (as in the poet Ted Hughes)
Jones (as in Tom Jones, the Welsh singer)
Lloyd as in the English bank
Morris
Povey
Price
Pritchard
Rees
Thomas (as in Dylan Thomas, poet)
Williams

More information from:
Book
Welsh names by D Geraint Lewis.ISBN 978-0-7524-4636-3. I bought this book for £2.99 in Tesco in Fishguard, Wales.
Websites
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_surnames
https://www.wales101.com/welsh-baby-boys-names

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. Teacher of English and other languages and creative writing. Please share links to your favourite posts.

Wales' Last Invasion Tapestry and the Bayeux Tapestry

Fishguard's town hall, painted green, is easy to find.

Downstairs is a three panel tiled panorama of Fishguard and Goodwick.

Here is the train which brings you to Fishguard, perhaps from Paddington Station, London, or elsewhere in England, Scotland or Wales, via Cardiff, Newport or Swansea, depending on time and route.

The Welsh lady, Jemima, who captured French invaders.

Typical Welsh woman's high Black Welsh hat and red cloak, national costume worn by Jemima, which fooled the French into thinking soldiers were marching around.

The long gallery housing the 100 foot tapestry.

Some souvenirs of Wales sold in the shop and tourist information centre of the ground floor of the town hall in Fishguard. (More goodies such as Welsh wooden carved love spoons in craft shops around the town.)

Photos by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Problem
How do you celebrate the successes of the men and women of Wales?

Answer
With Fishguard's imitation of the Bayeux Tapestry. On the one hand it's a celebration of a victory over the French invaders, in 1797, on the other hand it is a tribute to the enduring popularity of the French Bayeux Tapestry which is a tourist attraction in Hastings in England.

Watch the fascinating film of how the story was researched. The backing and wool were obtained at the best value price. The drawings were made, with trips including one to the church which the French soldiers pillaged, and where they surrendered. Then the drawing was transferred to the backing. Finally, the kinds of stitches were selected, to make the whole tapestry consistent although each panel was sewn by a different groups of stitchers.

It all took time. Not without a few mishaps. One enthusiastic embroiderer was told her stitching was lovely, but she had sewn the wrong colour! She had to unpick it and embroider it all over again. Despite this, everybody was delighted with the new friendships, new skills, and contributing to something which enhanced tourism to the region and might last for centuries.

Tips
First stop:
Last Invasion Tapestry Museum
Town Hall
Fishguard
Pembrokeshire
Wales
www.visitWales.com
Fishguard Tourist Information Centre is on the ground floor.
See tile three part mural by children on ground floor. See tapestry upstairs. Watch the film.
Also see the website for Pembrokeshire tourist board.

2nd Stop
Royal Oak Pub
Fishguard Square
Fishguard
Pembrokeshire
This is where the peace treaty was signed when the French army surrendered.

3rd Stop
Lower Town where Dylan Thomas' Under Milk Wood was filmed starring Richard Burton.
The Ship Inn served the cast and crew. See memorabilia.

4th Stop
Fishguard Hotel, restaurant and Bar
Goodwick
See the story of how Richard Burton stayed here, panel on left of the bar. Fine view over the bay and on the terrace.

Tips
Read about the Bayeux Tapestry In England which inspired the one in Wales.
St Mary in the Castle
Pelham Crescent
Hastings
East Sussex
England
www.visit1066 country.com

Events:
Music Festival 24 July-4 August 2017.
Writers' Holiday Feb 2018.
www.fishguardmusicfestival.co.uk
www.writersholiday.net

Travel and Tours
https://www.visitbritainshop.com/world/ (trips, tours, offers: London; England, Scotland, Wales)

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. I have other posts on Wales and speaking Welsh. Please share links to  your favourite posts.

Welsh, Words, "Would Like" What to say in Welsh, Why Visit Wales and Ireland

View of Fishguard Bay, Wales. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Wedding at Fishguard Bay Hotel.

Problem
How do you say I would like in Welsh? This is a problem when translating from English into any other language.

Answer
I am learning Welsh from Duo Lingo. Their simple English-Welsh lessons often give alternative answers but they gave the Welsh which I translated as I would like which was not allowed. I wondered whether the Welsh had only one phrase, in which case my alternative should have been allowed. However, according to somebody who replied in the forum, the Welsh English goes like this.

• Hoffwn i... - I would like...
• Dw i eisiau... - I want...

If you want to hear how it is pronounced, go to www.Duolingo.

Story
Children of today speak simply and more directly.
For example:
How are you? to an elderly person requires the answer
Very well, thank you.
A young person says
Fine.
That sounds terribly rude to an older person.

Why Learn Welsh Words?
Why would anybody want, or need, or like, to speak or understand Welsh?
If you drive or take the train across Wales, you will see many signs in Welsh. Why not take a few free language lessons?

Why Go To Wales?
Writers' Holiday
Many of my friends are going to the Writers Holiday in Fishguard, Wales, this week. You can book for a week or be a day visitor.

History and Films
Fishguard is also the setting for many movies or films from the past such as Moby Dick and Dylan Thomas's Under Milk Wood, starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.

You can read about the making of the films in the bar of the Fishguard Bay Hotel which is above the port where you catch the ferry to Ireland.

Ireland And Wales
Some people go through Wales because they need to in order to get the ferry to Ireland. You might do so deliberately in order to Enjoy and two destination trip to both Wales and Ireland.

Tourist Information
www.visitWales.com
www.wales.com
www.gofishguard.co.uk/
http://www.writersholiday.net
http://www.directferries.co.uk/fishguard_rosslare_ferry.
http://www.directferries.co.uk/ferries_from_wales_to_ireland. (Choosing which ferry route.)
http://www.irishtourist.com/wexford/towns/rosslare/
www.duolingo.com (Welsh, Gaelic, English for speakers of other languages, other languages)
I have several other posts on Wales and learning Welsh. Please share links to your favourite posts.

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.

Fishguard Bay - Setting For Under Milk Wood

A plaque on the little Harbour at Fishguard Bay tells you this was used as a setting for the film of Under Milk Wood, the poem written by Welsh poet Dylan Thomas, in the film starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. You can happily while away an afternoon walking around the bay. Or watching or participating in the kayaking. You might like to take the bus around the bay to the Fishguard Bay hotel, on the hillside opposite, actually in Goodwick, with a view over Fishguard Bay. This was where Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton and Peter O'Toole stayed when making the film.

Back down on Fishguard Bay, The Cafe on the Quay is a cheerful place for tea, with a small gift area. Proceedings are presided over by jolly Jo, who will tell you about local events, boat competitions and music festivals, and people, such as the twins and the police.

The houses around the bay and throughout Fishguard are painted in contrasting colours, creams and greens, and blues and plums and pinks and rust red. The Town Hall is green, and that's where you find the tapestry about the ladies with their black hats and red shawls who helped head off an invasion by the French.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.

What to do in Fishguard: the ferry, beach, books on the sea, and sea life exhibition

Fishguard is a quaint two centre harbour and village, end of the train line, where the boat train meets the Ferry crossing to Ireland. Fishguard's fun is seeing the sea and learning about wildlife. As you walk along the front, watching children leap over the low rock, you are invigorated by the sea breeze and the sea smell, tangy, salty, sharp, evoking memories of seaweed, fishy.

The Tesco Express sells bottles of water and sandwiches for £1.10 and fruit packs if you want to go for a healthy walk. By the tills are books on the area, Wales, and wildlife.

Opposite Tesco, across the road, is a seafront path leading to a large glass-sided, two-storey building containing a cafe, gift shop and exhibition areas.
 The Information counter by the doorway has lots of leaflets and people to answer your questions. An exhibition with a tour guide for a small cost every hour or so is about sealife and has a video and aquariums.

The handy gift shop sells jewellery and scarves and items for making mould of sand, and books on birds, seabirds, insects, flowers, SAS survival.

Check out their second hand books for sale making money for the Ocean project.

Birds and books and fish and jewellery.

The bus doesn't run on Sunday. You will have to walk uphill to the Fishguard Bay hotel, where you can buy a bar lunch and read about the filming of Moby Dick and Dylan Thomas's Under Milk Wood.

If you really want to see the sea, you can take an afternoon trip to Ireland (Rosslare). If you are British or Irish you do not need a passport, just a drivelling license or utility bill. (Check the Stena site for up to date details.) The cost of the trip is only £5 for a foot passenger.

Next post will be about the tapestry and history.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer, author, speaker.
Author of twenty books, the latest being Larry the Talking Labrador.

Fishguard, Famous for Moby Dick, Under Milk Wood and Lusitania

Isambad Kingdom Brunel (1806-1859), whose statue stands on Paddington station, built the railway lines west from Paddington to Bristol, across bridges he built, such as the Bristol Suspension Bridge (opened 1864), on to Wales, where ships such as the passenger ships Brunel designed were to carry passengers to the USA (SS Great Britain 1843).
This was around more than a century ago.

Fishguard Harbour railway station opened 1906 jot serve the ferry service to Ireland.

Today the  Fishguard ferry and ship port, still runs a ferry service to Ireland. The trains from London are designed to meet the ferries. That explains why the second train I could have caught on a Saturday arrived at 1.30 in the morning. I thought the Fishguard Bay hotel would be locked up for the night, and nobody would be pleased to see me. The reason is that the ferry leaves at 2 am. The train passengers are expected to have time to get into the ferry.

Why do boats and trains leave late at night or early in the morning? No, it's not so that your taxi has a clear run racing you to or from the airport of ferry port. It's so that your boat or plane disgorges its business passengers at the right time for them to arrive at the office in the morning.

The Railway lines had transformed travel in the UK since the 1860s, when the world's perception of time changed. No longer could every town time itself independently and accurately in time with the sunlight. Instead the towns across Britain had to co-ordinate their clocks and watches with Greenwich mean time abbreviated to GMT.

From the port of Fishguard the ships left for the USA. In WWI the ill-fated Lusitania sank. Later ships left from the port of Southampton. The Titanic left in 1913, an unlucky year for her passengers, although lucky for anybody who missed catching the ship.

Today the train lines still take you from London, England, to Fishguard in Wales. The big hotel on the hillside overlooking the bay is Fishguard Bay hotel. By the bar are accounts and pictures of famous films made in the area. Moby Dick was filmed in the bay which you can see from the hotel's front windows and terrace. So was Under Milk Wood in 1971, starring Richard Burton, Peter O'Toole and Glynis Johns who stayed at the hotel. The old newspaper accounts tell of Liz Taylor and Richard Burton staying at the hotel. In 1979 the hotel was designated a building of Historic and Architectural and Interest.

Fishguard Bay Hotel is a popular spot for weddings of local people. A bride was on the terrace greeting her guests, when I arrived in July 2015.

Her white dress contrasting with the green trees Wales, like England, is green from abundant rainfall. Wales is the land which inspired the best-selling book How Green Was My Valley.

The bride could have served a wedding breakfast of meet or fish, followed by a disco with a buffet of hamburgers. Not everybody wants to get all dressed up and then eat with their fingers, but finger food is the fashion nowadays and cocktail parties have always served canapes. As Marie Antoinette never said, Let them eat burgers.

Fishguard bay serves freshly cooked food. I was particularly partial to the plum tart with cream. Does the Fishguard Bay Hotel serve fish? (The phrase is the pope a Catholic springs to mind.) Yes, sometimes salmon, sometimes trout, almost always a meat dish a fish dish and a vegetarian dish.

The hotel is currently being upgraded. The sea view from the terrace and dining room are delightful. But the rooms are a mixture. A group of us were playing musical bedrooms. A previous year I was sharing a room so we had a front room with sea view and sea gulls looking through the window at us trying to get in.

I asked one of the seagulls if he'd been an unpaid extra in a famous film. But he didn't answer. I think that was before his time.

This year I had a room at the back, 119, no sea view, a sheer cliff of greenery. Ideal if you want to write a script for a horror movie. Things brightened up literally, when I discovered two spotlights over the bed. I complained that the light over the mirror was not working. Immediately up came a desk lamp. A day late (Sunday) the manager produced a replacement bulb. My room had a double bed and bath. TV. All day seaside music from gulls outside.

Several rooms are singles. One of the front single rooms has the view obscured by a tree which apparently has a preservation order on it.

The room with the least outside light is ground floor room number three, which has two high windows, like being in a castle with narrow high windowed, except you are on the ground floor. Oddly enough, I thought this was an ideal room for a honeymoon couple, romantic anniversary, or jolly dirty weekend, where you want total privacy. It was also the best decorated room, not that Victorian royalty carpet and with cream walls so loved by old hotels, and whoever decorated other parts of this hotel, instead bright white and brand new contrasting colours, delightful.

See the hotel whilst it still has the old atmosphere and creaking stairs. The downstairs front room with the magnificent decorated ceiling is already modernised at great expense. The old high ceiling has been replaced by a part false ceiling suspended to reveal the old high ceiling around the edges. The modernisation includes a handy a screen for showing football films, a screen which can be let down to conceal the view of the carved wooden fireplace.

The staff can't do enough for you. I asked for a couple of extra hangers and got half a dozen. Slices of lemon for the water jug. They have weddings many weekends in summer, just when two or more members of staff take off on their own holidays or family weddings.

The Visit Wales awards the hotel a 3 star rating. When the hotel first opened, it had a designated smoking room. Now it is entirely non-smoking.

Writers' Holiday is held here annually, attracting visitors from Wales, England, Scotland and as far away as Australia.

For the 2016 programme - see Writers' Holiday website.
writersholiday.net

(Writers Holiday 2015 July Monday 27 to Saturday Aug 1st courses include Writing Children's books and Travel photos.)
Writers Holiday Feb 2016 19-21 £229, or day delegate £129.
Writers Holiday Monday 25th July to Saturday 30th 2016 £499 full board and accommodation or day guest only rate of £299 (Courses include writing ebooks.)

www:fishguardtrains.info
wikipedia.org/wiki/Fishguard_Harbour_railway_station
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isambard_Kingdom_Brunel
Fishguard Bay Hotel
Quay Road
Goodwick
Pembrokeshire
Wales
SA64 OBT
Tel:01348 873571
email:reservationsfbh@gmail.com
Website www.fishguardbayhotel.co.uk

Angela Lansbury, travel writer, photographer, speaker.

What's new in Wales? Slate Cavern with trampolines

What's new in North Wales? Trampolines in Bleanu Ffestiniog.
That's not how I spell it - but the Welsh use one spelling the English another.  The spellchecker then changes it. I'm sure you can get the spelling you need from one of the websites.

At the World Travel market I met Kathryn Colling Cambria Tours Content and Marketing Manager.
I also met Gareth Daniels of North Wales Tourism.

This year I went to North Wales to Writers Holiday at Fishguard, where Under Milk Wood by Dylan Thomas was filmed. The holiday is at the big hotel in the area, Fishguard Bay Hotel up on the cliff overlooking the bay. Guess which famous film stars stayed there? See my previous posts. I'll add a photo later.

writersholiday.net

Trampolines bounce below.
www.bouncebelow.net
www.gonorthwales.co.uk
They are also on Facebook and twitter
facebook /GoNorthWales

If you are passing through South wales,
wwwvisitcardiff.com