Wales – Day 2 – Chester

I don’t know why I’m having a hard time with this.  I want to tell you all about our trip,  but I keep putting off writing it.  I don’t want to be boring.  We did this, then we did that, then we took more pictures.  Would you like to see my slideshow?

Okay, I’m over it.  Come see my slideshow.

I like the E at the end of cafe there. Is it purposefully whimsical or just a happy accident?

First, the title of this post is not accurate, since Chester is not in Wales.  I know, I know.  We went to Wales only leave it again after one night.  We’re terrible people, I’m sure.  Shut up.  After fourteen hours of sleep, we were well rested and ready to see something.  Since it was the morning of New Year’s Eve, we decided the nearest city might be a good place to ring in the new year, so we headed to Chester, less than 45 minutes from our cottage.  I wouldn’t call it the most exciting of days, but we had a nice quiet time.  Saw the ruins of a Roman amphitheatre, right outside the old city walls,

and then went looking for lunch.  We spent a lot of this trip hunting for our next meal.  We wandered into the shopping district,

had lunch at Dutton’s (I had a really good panini – roast beef, horseradish, brie, and onions),

Hello from Dutton's

bought a toothbrush, and spent some time exploring Chester Cathedral.  Someone was practicing on the organ.  A cathedral tour isn’t complete without organ music as a soundtrack.

We didn’t know quite what to do with ourselves after that, since it was only five, but all the shops had closed and it was a bit early for dinner.  We were coming to the realization that we weren’t going to make it to midnight, at least not in Chester.  We wandered around town a little bit and found ourselves back at the old city walls.  We’d seen several signs saying that Chester has the most complete city walls in Great Britain, so we decided to see for ourselves.  We walked the entire circuit on top of the walls, starting at the amphitheatre.  (It was only two miles.)  It was dark by then, so I didn’t get a single good picture.  They’re all too dark, too blurry, too grainy, or all of the above.  Except of the ferris wheel.  Is it a requirement in the UK that every city of a certain size have one?

When we finished our sentry walk, it was still not quite 6:30 – I’m boring myself here.  Short version – we didn’t do anything exciting.  Had dinner at an Italian place (whether we were going to be allowed to eat there without a reservation was not entirely clear for the first few minutes, but eventually we were shown to a table – very good dinner),

and then we headed back to the cottage.  We weren’t sure we were going to bother staying up until midnight to usher in the new year for a while.  On the one hand, why not?  It was New Year’s Eve, we were on vacation, we could walk on the wild side and stay up late.  On the other hand, why bother?  We were by ourselves in a cottage very near the middle of nowhere with no champagne (we had a bottle of wine and some beer, though) and no TV.  What would we do, watch the clock turn to midnight?

I won’t keep you in suspense any longer.  We did, in fact, watch the clocks turn to midnight.  Happy New Year!

4 Comments

  1. Jessica

    That’s more than we did. We went out to dinner, came home and watched a movie, then went to bed at around 10. Party animals, we. 🙂

  2. Zannah

    We certainly didn’t feel British in Chester. With everything closing at four, we didn’t quite know what to do with ourselves (although we solved that problem with our walk on the walls). I felt like if we’d had somewhere to go, we might have felt British. We got more comfortable over the next couple of days. And we were very happy to be there, closed shops and all.

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