Lamphey, Wales, United KingdomLamphey Hall Hotel, Lamphey Wales
I didn't sleep that well and was already up when the alarm rang at 7:30 am.
I showered and washed my hair, finished up the blueberries and strawbettrries for breakfast, but I had to leave the yogurt. Took the small amoiunt of cereal. Then I watched TV until it was time to leave for the train. Oh, yeah, we walked down to the garage to bring down the garbage and recycling. This was potentially tricky because it was not clear we could back in if the doors closed on us, but with two of us, we managed OK.
Then we walked to the train station with our luggage. It was harder with the daypack since it is now so heavy. Why is that? We caught the train and rode for over 2 hours, then transferred at Caernarthen to another train up ahead on the same track for a ride to Lamphey. It seemed as if this train was faster. We had earlier passed Swansea and there were a lot of apartments but now we were getting more into farm country.
We had a very short walk to our new lodging, the Lamphey Hall Hotel where we have a room on the first floor right between the entrance door and the reception desk.
It is a fairly large, comfortable room with sink outside the little room built into the bedroom that houses the toilet and shower stall. We checked in a few minutes before the dining room was to close and, since we were starved, we rushed back and ordered lunch. We only wanted something light so got the potato leek soup with bread and Welsh butter which was very good and quite adequate but then Marilynn had a yen for dessert, so, of course, I followed and ordered the trifle and both of our desserts were much too much and even I, with my clean plate policy, could not manage more than half. It was a crime to leave it.
We then settled into the room and decided to go for a walk before dinner, if we could even contemplate eating again. We set off and saw a sign for Lamphey Palace, which we followed to an intersection with driveway to the Best Western secluded in a forest. We had to follow a road around the high stone wall with the hope we might get into the yard with ruins in it that we could see through a few gaps.
Marilynn saw a man come out the gate and realized that it had a latch so we went in and explored the moss and lichen-covered ruins of a bishop's palace. There were only a few signs but lots of gaping windows, some stone staircases to views from a second story but no real buildings were left. There were a few open spaces and bottom floors with stone floors. It was all very picturesque. On the way back we got a bit closer to the sheep in the field. We passed the farmers association fairgrounds that was being filled with lots of trucks and some tents for a forthcoming exhibition we thought.
We came back to our hotel and searched for a place to have a lighter dinner since our hotel's menu was heavier than we really wanted. I located a place called the Lantern which was supposedly close by. When we walked the .2 miles, it turned out that the place had closed 5 years ago. A nearby gas station attendant recommended another place called the The Dial but they were all booked up and had no space until 8 pm so we came back to the Lamphey Hall Hotel. We came back and got a table, ordered salads and fries for Marilynn and smoked salmon terrine for me and glasses of red wine and managed to finish all except the fries since they gave Marilynn two bowls of them.
Back at the room, we watched Midsummer Murders. It is now 10 pm or a bit after and Marilynn is already under the covers. Now it is my turn since I have managed to do today's blog even if I still have one more day to catch up on. I only took photos on my phone and sent some out to Kara on whatsapp and to the rest of the family and Vesna and Sharon on gmail. Only Vesna has responded. Thank goodness for Vesna and Sharon!!
2025-05-22