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

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Hanoi has it all, rich and poor, alleys, museum, free museum

Alleys lead to rooms at the back. The rental is still very high in this area.

Crowded and crammed with goodies, the shops in the lighter brighter state of the art museums such as the Ethnology Museum and the History Museum - old times section with shop.

Motorbikes for rent, motorbike tours. 

We went to Halong Bay and spent one night on the superb cruise ship, Stella of the Seas - ideal for a honeymoon.

The city has several backpacker hostels in the old town. Boutique hotels at moderate prices including breakfast. 

Or grand hotels. If money is not object, a lake view hotel, or a skyscraper hotel. Or the Apricot, where we bought a pot of tea and a macaroon at tea-time. We sat in splendour watching others enjoy their three-tier cake stand tea.

What's Free?

The police museum. 

Author, Angela Lansbury.

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.

My Latest Discovery - Children's Illustration Museum in The Storybook Capital of America, Abilene, Texas, USA

Problem
What to see next and where?

Answer
I love literature and art.

I also love anything that's free. In addition to free admission, they have free fun art workshops for children on Saturday. Here's a free museum, in a place I have never visited. Abilene.

Didn't you love illustrated books as a child! I bet you still do.

It has changing exhibitions so you are sure to find something new. And a bookshop.

The idea for the place started with a meeting with the then Mayor and the illustrator, William Joyce, of a book set in Abilene. William Joyce is a co-founder of the museum.

See statue depicting the children from Santa Calls, "Childhood's Great Adventure" by Rick Jackson, downtown.

More statues are added every year in a ceremony.



By the way, the song Abilene is about another Abilene, in Kansas, which has an Eisenhower Museum.

National Centre For Childen's Illustrated Literature
Children's Illustration Museum
102 Cedar Street
Abilene
Texas
USA
79601

• Tel:+1-325-673-4586

Open 10-4 Tues-Saturday.
Closed Sunday and Monday.
One block away is the Grace Museum, which has lots of interactive activities for children. Also see the zoo.

Abilene Zoo. Photo in Wikipedia.

USA

https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Attraction_Review-g30138-d12677273-Reviews-Adamson_Spalding_Storybook_Garden-Abilene_Texas.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Center_for_Children%27s_Illustrated_Literature

https://www.nccil.org

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Literary_museums_in_the_United_States

www.visittheusa.com

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

Hiking and hostels: Wales and the world on a budget

Problem
How do you see Wales on a budget?

Answer
Camping, hiking and youth hostels.

Paddington, London
See supermarkets, Boots, and fast food outlets on Stations.

Food
Splurge: On the Arriva train, watch out for filling but pricey Welsh cakes - £1.50 for two tiny ones on the Arriva train.

Bargain: Tesco (at Fishguard in Wales and in London before catching the train): I bought Chocolate brownie flavour milk for £1. Sandwich for £1. (Often just ham on white bread. You have to add your own vegetables. Cucumber whole, or half, under £1.) Look for reduced price section.

Fruit: In July/August cherries five bananas for under £1. Pineapple £1. (You'll need a Swiss Army knife to cut it.) Cherries were down to 99p in Tesco, hard and not much flavour, but good if you want to avoid calorific chocolate snacks.

Carry a cool bag. Many hotels (such as Fishguard Bay Hotel) don't have fridges in the rooms. You would be more likely to find a fridge in a self-catering apartment. Rooms can get very hot in summer,  with windows closed to keep out sea gulls, or in winter with the central heating on. You might want to keep food, drinks and medication cool.

Cheap Ferry to Ireland
One day a week prices drop. Check their website. Normal prices are £12.50 return. You arrive at Rosslare. As far as I can see nothing much there except a beach, but you can add Ireland to places you've visited.

Cheapest Way to Get To Ireland?
If you want to stay overnight and see Ireland, you can take a train to the capital Dublin or spend a week touring by car. Prices vary wildly depending on your starting point, route and time of day and year or travel, booking in advance and so on.

One family I spoke to found, after extensive checking, that it was cheaper for them to fly from London, England, to Ireland and hire a car, than to drive to Wales and take their own car across on the ferry from Fishguard to Rosslare, which they had done regularly in previous years.

Tapestry Visit, Fishguard
The Last Invasion tapestry and the film about how they made it over two years, is beside the library upstairs, above the Tourist information office in the town hall, painted bright green on the main square in Fishguard.

Cardiff
In Cardiff the main museum is free. (You pay to go into the exotic, colourful, Castle Coch just outside town.)

In Caerleon look for the courtyard with shops and a cafe or two the wooden sculptures.

Seen From The Train?
Swansea's Liberty Stadium. Tours cost £10, but £5 for senior citizens. Other discounts for groups of 20 or more.

Tips
Ferries
http://www.directferries.co.uk/ferry_to_rosslare (Wales to Ireland and England to Ireland)
Hostels
https://www.booking.com/region/gb/wales.
Camping UK, Europe and Americas
https://www.pitchup.com/campsites/Wales/
Hotel comparison
https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/News
Destinations
St Davids
https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/St_Davids
http://www.visitwales.com
http://www.visitwales.com/holidays-breaks/family-holidays/free-family-attractions
http://www.newport.gov.uk/en/Leisure-Tourism/Attractions/Public-Art.aspx

Another Free Museum in Hong Kong - Po Leung Kuk Museum

Apart from the Sun Yat-sen museum, and the escalators up to it, what else is free to see in Hong Kong?

Po Leung Kuk Museum
After visiting the nearby Inn Side Out bar (shown in my previous post), near Causeway Bay MTR, I looked up the Po Leung Kuk museum I had passed walking on the way.

Wikipedia explains that the organisation originally rescued orphans, abandoned babies and girls from poor families who were sold off as lifelong servants working dawn to dusk for no pay, in effect slaves, and sometimes sold on to be prostitutes. Now it runs schools.

Po Leung Kuk Museum
Hong Kong

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

iExperience photos in Singapore: Free museum on Smart Nation technology

A free museum. Must be good. And ideas for smart technology in the home, office and streets.

What's for the home? Security. Identify where an intruder is. Watch remotely. (On the internet already I see many intruders turn out to be animals invading through the catflap!) For the street, an iPod like a large phone box with a seat containing a computer terminal and printer, which you can hire for an hour.

Here are more pictures. The entrance tells you that admission is free.

Photos by Angela Lansbury.

The vision if for Singapore to be a Smart Nation where technology offers exciting opportunities for all, said Prime Minister Lee in 2014. 

At the end the jolly girl in charge showed me how to like the exhibition on Facebook and be rewarded with a print-out of a photo. Plan which photo you would most like in advance.

Angela on left. Experience official on right.

The exhibition is in the link between City Hall MRT and Esplanade MRT.

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

Highly Recommended High Wycombe Museum

Free attraction. High Wycombe used to be a centre for wooden furniture. As a newlywed I went there to buy an extending round dining table. Driving back to High Wycombe, I expected 'High' Wycombe to be high, on a hilltop, but although you drive uphill, it is in a hollow with steep, wooded green slopes all around.
The museum has a delightful display of carved wooden chairs, my favourite novelty being the reversible garden chair (my photo below) which you can turn upside down. Why? If your chair's wet from rain or a pigeon used it first. Chairs, like the other displays, appeal to all ages. The low kiddie commode chair is near the teacher's high chair. The tall teacher's chair reminded me of high chairs at swimming pools and tennis matches.
I loved the video showing how chair legs were turned with a foot-operated string, like a treadle sewing machine.
Plenty for children to do and touch. Novelty toys to buy included small marionettes and tiny turning monkeys.
I was pleased to see the museum at the 2013 location, a peaceful old house with a lawn. Steep stairs mean the upstairs galleries are not accessible to some visitors so the council plans to move the whole caboodle to their more modern central location.
The old kitchen is another joy with useful explanations of how the servant bell panels worked. My late parents had one of those in Edgware. Loved the explanation of how electricity changed the domestic house. No wonder all the men had beards before electricity.
Useful timelines tied in with displays. I learned that both Disraeli and Churchill gave speeches in High Wycombe.