"Please mind the gap between the grass and the jagged rocks below"....WALES!

Hey everyone,

Okay so I’m going to get this up for you and plan on trying for tomorrow with the Cruise updated. First of all Wales was amazing...despite freezing cold wind and water it was beautiful and an incredibly adventurous weekend.

Friday we left London around noon from Victoria Coach Station. About 9 of us were taking the bus together so we listened to our Ipods, read, attempted to sleep, and played hangman for the next 8 hours. It was about hour 6 (5 pm) when I saw a witch and realized it was Halloween...really weird...I had completely forgotten!! It isn’t celebrated widely in the UK but I saw a surprising amount of people dressed up and windows decorated....weird to feel like you missed a holiday, if anything I probably saved myself a cavity though!! We arrived in Haverfordwest, Wales around 8 pm exhausted and ready to kick the bus as we exited. A van from Preseli-Venture met us and with a full van we made our way about ten minutes to the lodge. There we were brought to our rooms and made our way to the lodge for dinner with the approximately 35 other Richmond students at Preseli for the weekend. The lodge was quite nice: our rooms were almost hostel style with odd numbers of bunk-beds in each room spread our over a few floors. My room was with 3 other girls and the weekend consisted of hanging clothing everywhere to dry.

Anyways dinner was wonderful, a real home-cooked meal of lasagna and apple pie. We were then briefed as to our groups for the weekend and allowed to hang around for the evening. Every part of the lodge is connected but the actual lodge where you eat and hang around is separate from the area where you sleep and shower, which for noise purposes was a really smart idea. The common area includes a small bar area, with very cheap beer, so all 35 of us proceeded to hang around, have some Guinness and play card games for the better part of the next 2 hours. Around 11 pm we decided it was a fabulous idea to venture out and find the beach at the suggestion of the owners. They said the beach would be lovely this time of night and was only a 10 minute walk. Word to the wise: when you’re in the middle of nowhere....and I mean like the only light is from a village about a mile away consisting of 20 houses....and its about 35 degrees.....and you only have 2 flashlights amongst all of you....and you don’t know where you’re going.....(aside from the beer as well).....you should probably think about your footwear and attire before you venture through the woods to a beach you don’t know the exact location of. (You have to do something cool on Halloween, even if you’re in Wales)

So about 45 minutes later...and about 25 people down we have encountered the longest mud-swamp path I have seen in recent history....my fuggs (fake Uggs) are soaked through and my jeans are knee deep with cold Welsh mud. But hey, it’s an adventure and I’m laughing my head off at the fact several people have lost shoes because they sunk in the mud, we have no clue where the beach is other than that we can hear it, and again little to no light and it’s 35 degrees outside. Keep in mind this vaguely resembles the Blair-Witch Project at this point, we have one tiny white flashlight, there’s no moon, I’m hearing weird animals and we’ve dropped from 35 to maybe 8 people, got my fill of Halloween scare. A few wipe outs later we decide to turn around, realizing clearly we have no clue where we are and probably shouldn’t push our luck. After a shower for myself and one for my fuggs I headed to sleep under nice warm blankets ready for the next morning.

Saturday morning...up at 8 am sharp...alarms going off and the owner wrapping at our doors! We head to breakfast and prepare for the days activities. My day is coasteering and hiking. Coasteering is briefly described to us: It was invented on the Pembrokeshire Coast (which is where the lodge is located), and is the act of making your way along the coast literally....swimming along, rock climbing and cliff jumping back down into the ocean. We had NO IDEA what we were in for at 9 am that morning. We go out to what I will refer to as the ‘barn’...it contained all the equipment for ever outdoor activity we would encounter that weekend. We were each outfitted with a 5mm winter-wetsuit, water-socks, gloves, water shorts (for sliding down rocks), life/flotation vests, and finally helmets. Sooooo being in your bathing suit in later October in literally 40 degrees is cold...just an FYI. Got on all the gear as quick as possible while singing some version of ‘Sexy Can I?’ with the girls and made our way to the vans. We were all in groups of no more than 13...we were just the first group to ‘take the plunge’. So we get to the beach and put on our sneakers (we had to bring a pair to get wet....I got cheapies at TK-Maxx...TK, I know weird). So we’re on the beach like okay cool and the instructor says ‘alright, lets go’....and heads straight into the ocean....okay!?!?! So we waddle on in behind her shrieking and being babies about the cold...but let me tell you those wet-suits do their job....I was pretty warm within a few seconds....but then told to do a ‘Mexican-dunk’....didn’t like the sound of that, for obvious reasons, we all then had to dunk under....most accurate feeling of BRAIN FREEZE ever experienced in my life.

So we swim along, and you realize kicking does no good, so you find you let your feet hang and use your arms you actually get somewhere. Making our way along the coat within about 20 feet, we made our way to the rocks, while avoiding the tides pushing us to smack our chins on them. The rocks are jagged and wet, so climbing is carefully done. We are about a foot out of water, no big drop; several people do slip and simply climb back up to re-join. Getting in and out of the water is the chilliest part of the ordeal. So we trudge through water, to a small island to make our first ‘jump’....really about 2 feet out of water, no big....we are told to do a belly-flop as the water is shallow and this will revent injury...belly flops are not attractive but I decide I can’t affort more injury this year and obey. We climb through caves to other parts of the coast and have a second jump....you think ‘oh no big’ but then you get up to where the jump is and you’re realizing it’s 10 feet out of water...so everyone screams a little on the way down but gets the feel for the adrenalin of the sport. I love this, we all do, we sit on rocks for a bit and other than spotting a seal we discuss dropping out of school and moving to Wales to jump in the ocean for a living.....sadly they aren’t hiring so we carry on. (My parents are sighing of relief right now). So we vote whether or not to take a long swim to a big cliff....or a short one to a small cliff....go big or go home...we’re off to the big one....mind you its 4 girls and 10 guys so the intensity level is set high.

So you start climbing up a rock, and you become entirely focused on climbing and not falling and suddenly you’re up there....cool, amazing view, ‘Okay this is the jump spot’....30 feet above sea level.....You will have to see the pictures.....it’s just really really high. Hardest part obviously is stepping off. So about halfway through I decide it’s my turn....I stand there....I stand there some more...no rush....then the instructor counts down from 3 and I decide I’m never gonna go if I don’t listen to the crazy instructor. So I step off....heart drops, enough time to say hi to a few people, and a scream later I hit the water....ANNNNNNDDDD I’m climbing up the cliff fast as I can to do it AGAIN!! I jump 2 more times, it’s amazing, like the ultimate diving board except pencil dive is the only way not to break limbs. Incredibly amazing, I can’t describe it.

I need to carry on, this is getting long...you see why the cruise is taking forever to write!!!!! So we swim our way back through another cave, find a small waterfall to shower off in and climb up an embankment and back to the beach. Now it’s time to take off the wetsuits and get into sweats....in the middle of a road in Wales...it looked quite funny....I have a picture...it’s PG no worries. So we went back, had lunch, go ready for the hike after watching people come back saying ‘don’t do the long one’...with mud up to their calves. Eh, I’d already ventured in pitch black in the mud, how bad could daylight be?! So we opted for the self-guided (they were all that way) 7 mile hike along the Pembrokeshire coast starting at 2pm. We were given a map and told to follow the ocean all the way back.

The hiking lasted 3 hours....winds had to have been high because I could lean into the wind and it held me...and the mud, well, it’s Wales, I’m convinced mud the national animal or something. No wait, actually sheep are...we aw 10 million sheep on our walk...hands down the sheep have an uprising, Wales is in trouble. Anyways....despite the freezing, it was stunning. The coast looks quite like I’d imagine Scotland and Ireland do and the amazing thing was it’s all at your own choice...there are no fences or wiring between you and the cliffs...and the ocean below...the running joke became ‘mind the gap between the grass and the jagged rocks below’...haha, my Mom’s not laughing. Well because of the wind, we kept our distance. Long hike, couple people slipping in the mud (there were very steep portions up and down) and a hike in the woods later (OH and mind you we figured out exactly where we went wrong on our hike the night before....we were 5 FEET away from the correct paths....stupid American...oh well). Found the lodge....raced for showers (hot showers, YAY)...cleaned up and went to dinner! Curry and fresh bread awaited us with homemade cheesecake and hot chocolate to finish. It is 7 pm and grown 20 year olds are hunched over asking what time it is...we decide this is an opportune time to drink Guinness once again...I would vote this as the theme decision of the group in Wales. Three hours later 7 of us are an hour into the most intense game of Jenga I have ever played in my life. We’re at 28 levels high...and although most of us have only had one or two beers it isn’t helping...so after approximately 55 minutes of play and several spectators later the tower comes down...and we call it a night (I had to share, it was a great game). Heading across the walkway to the dorms you can’t help but look up...you can see all the stars so clearly. You can even see the Milky-Way....it’s beautiful....no city for miles and miles, I enjoy this for as long as I can before surrendering to the cold and heading for my covers...it’s 10:45 pm and 95% of us have gone to sleep....this has to be a first.

Sunday (Today): My body is feeling the day before...we’re all aching pretty bad. Quick breakfast and we’re back to the barn for wetsuits round two....here’s the catch...now they’re all wet from the day before...AND the wind is howling....so it’s endurance time. We get down to our bathing-suits and chattering our teeth pull on soaking, cold wetsuits, booties, and gloves...thankfully once again they warm almost instantly! Whoever invented winter wetsuits knew what they were doing. We hop on the bus and take a 20 minute bus ride down the coast to a beautiful beach to ‘learn to surf’...the challenge really was ‘learn to walk to the water with your board without knocking anyone else unconscious....the wind had a mind of its own and really wanted to steal our boards. The instructor decides we need to warm up so we take a job down the beach, drop to the sand a few times, grapevine, shuffle and finally head out into the water with our boards. The next three hours were spent trying to catch nothing more than about a foot and a half....but it was a fun time with the friends if nothing else. I got up about 4 times...which was good because the wind really didn’t want us to. Everyone did really well, time flew and before we knew it the day was done and it was time to head back to the lodge. Race...literally we raced....for the showers...and had to quickly eat and pack for the 2pm shuttle into Haverfordwest to get the bus. They said it was an opportune time to hit up a pub...and so the drop off point is a pub...35 Americans crowded into a pub...where once again we were faced with the dilemma...Guinness or no Guinness....you know how it ended. We all enjoyed one last pint in Wales and headed for the bus station. About 8 hours later I ended up safe and sound back in London.

And now I have zero energy left in me....and I am soooo tired....but really wanted to update because I felt guilty the whole trip!! But anyways I have pictures from the weekend, I had a waterproof camera so hopefully have those up in coming days under a separate post!!

Lots of love,

Xoxo,

Kate