Why is it that Americans find castles so fascinating?

It has been quite a while since I've updated, and I'm so sorry for that! It has been quite a week, that is for sure. Much has been going on with work and, of course, I'm still getting settled.

Last week, I travelled with Rhi to Carmarthen where Alun's constituency office is located. I met Marc and Christina, who work there and of course Alun. We only got to stay for about a half hour and it took us nearly an hour to get there. However, Rhi and I had to get back for afternoon meetings. The little bit of Welsh countryside that I got to see was absolutely beautiful. That day, Mark Major told us that we weren't working on Friday, so we could make weekend plans if we liked. Naturally, we took this as an opportunity to travel to Paris, but with the recent fire that had happened in the channel, we weren't able to come up with an emergency reason to hop the train and get to Paris, so all of our weekend plans were shot. Dianne and Ben went off to Scotland for the weekend, leaving Chelsea, Jill and I to the pubs and clubs. We went out for a bit on Thursday night but realised that our tough day at work had been a bit much and we were all in bed by 11 that night.

Friday, we got up and headed downtown to do a bit of shopping before planning our route for the pubs that night. Unfortunately, the stores don't close late on Friday's, so we ended up eating at Pizza Hut and going home to get ready. We had quite a late night at the pubs after meeting some silly blokes who bought most of our drinks that evening. We caught a cab back and slept until pretty late in the day on Saturday.

Chelsea and I moped around a bit on Saturday due to a pretty extreme battle with homesickness, but after a soak in the hot tub at Chelsea's flat and a quick chat on AIM with some friends from home, I was back to normal. I went to bed pretty late after watching some late night American television and slept better than I had in days.

Sunday, Chelsea and I headed out around 1pm toward the city centre to do a bit of tourist stuff and take some pictures. We went to Cardiff castle and took a tour of the mansion there. Then, we did some exploration of the grounds and took some pretty cool pictures, if I do say so myself. After that, we walked about in a park nearby and then took a stroll along the riverside near the rugby stadium. We then went back to snag Jill from near the Assembly and head to the other side of town to do a bit of grocery shopping. Much to our horror, after we had walked a total of about 15 miles for the day, the grocery store was closed and we were forced to grab a cab and head back home. Here are some pictures of our excursion for your viewing pleasure:

Here are Chelsea and I atop the Cardiff Castle stairs. The building behind us is the house at Cardiff Castle, which we took a pretty informative tour of.

It was really interesting to hear the stories of all the things that went on within the walls of the castle - basically that it housed the town of Cardiff. If it weren't for coal being discovered in Cardiff, there would have never been a city there. How interesting to think about, right?

This is quite possibly one of the coolest things EVER. I loved the fact that this castle actually had a moat.

This was taken from my daring lean over the top deck of the castle. It was pretty exciting.

Here is a view of the castle from across the way.

I laughed last week when I received an email from one of the Labour Party workers detailing what it was that we'd be researching for a debate scheduled for this week. At the end, when explaining what was needed for a supplementary question, he asked, "What is it about castles that Americans love so much?"

This is quite possibly one of the prettiest views from the park that sits next to the castle. I loved the red trees and the way the light was hitting everything. It looks even more beautiful in person.

This is a picture from Cardiff Bay. The Assembly uses this building for random things. I use it to look at and think of how pretty it is.

This is a picture of the Bay at night. I see this every day and every night. I am so completely obsessed with this place. The building with the writing on it is the opera house. We're pretty excited to announce that Beauty and the Beast is going to be here in October!!

Then far off in the distance, you can see Mermaid Quay and Roald Dahl Plass. I love the fact that I live here. Really, I do.

If you'd like to see more of these photos, and you're lucky enough to be my Facebook friend, you can check them out there. Otherwise, I will have them uploaded to my Flickr site in the next day or so and I'll share that link when I get them uploaded!

I'll be updating this week once again to talk about all of the stuff that we've been doing this week. I hope all is going well and that everyone is healthy and happy! Cheers! XXXXOOOO!!!