We were all packed and ready to check out before we enjoyed one last breakfast, after which we drove to Caerphilly to visit the castle. The car park closest to the castle was full so rather than wait for a space we chose to park in the long stay car park. This meant we had a lovely walk around the moat to the castle entrance.

The castle is impressive, the second largest in Britain; after Windsor. There is a one-way route around the castle, which helps avoid problems on narrow staircases and ensures that the visitor doesn’t miss anything. The remains of the castle are impressive and some of its rooms are set up to give insights into life in a 14^th century feudal castle. Before leaving the castle, I purchased the guidebook.

We decided that we would have lunch in town but the two places we spotted on our walk to the castle were not what we were looking for. Mr C spotted Glanmors Bakery. Tempted by the delicious offerings, we both chose a prawn mayo roll and to follow Mr C had a chocolate éclair and I chose a vanilla slice.

Then sun had put its hat on so we were able to enjoy our tasty delights sitting on a bench in the nearby Dafydd Williams Gardens.

A lone seagull had his beady eye on us, but flew off when I had taken the last bite of my prawn roll. He returned later as we were leaving to hoover up the prawns that had escaped from Mr C’s roll.

My vanilla slice was delicious, but rather messy to eat. My fingers ended up covered with the sticky icing topping. This meant that I was unable to take photographs of beautiful autumn leaf colours or the cheeky seagull. I scraped the excess sticky icing from my fingers into the box that had contained our lunch. Back at the car there was the luxury of wet wipes that left my fingers (almost) sticky free.

Our TomTom SatNav worked hard on our journey home, rerouting us several times to avoid Friday afternoon traffic and taking us off the motorway to arrive back home at the time it had originally scheduled. This gave us time to pick up grocery items for fine dining (zingy salmon and crispy potatoes) at home

During our brief vacation we enjoyed the slate grey skies of Wales rather than the crystal blue skies of Madeira. The grey clouds kept their moisture to themselves rather than sharing it with us below.

We left Cardiff with unfinished business… We will be back.

Paramahansa Yogananda