Where Once Again I Am Thwarted By The Not-Detailed-Enough Excursion Descriptions, But Wales Is Beautiful Anyway
The vetting process for the offered excursions for Viking cruises is excruciating. First, we have to wait until the actual excursions are finalized (as opposed to the “suggested” versions). Then we have to read through the descriptions and glean as much actual information as possible, which can be virtually impossible. The descriptions are vague, and the categories (“easy”, “moderate”, “demanding”) are so general as to be meaningless. For example, the Dublin bus tour was rated “moderate” for no reason that I can see (other than the longish walk to the bathroom). Leeds Castle and Canterbury Cathedral was a true “moderate” – a bit of walking, some on cobblestones, but completely flat. And a few stairs in the castle.
Today’s excursion to the South Stack Bird Preserve was rated “moderate”. When I called Viking to get a more detailed version of the description, it sounded do-able: short walk to the visitor center, and an hour walk with a guide, followed by free time in the reserve. The walk sounded fine. It also sounded like there was other stuff to see in case it was more than I could handle.
Reality: Good news: There was zero walk to the visitor center (the bus was parked right in front of it). Bad news: The walk included 40 uneven, slippery, and steep stone steps down. The guide said the steps were designed by a man well over 6 ft tall “with 7 foot long legs”. This did not sound good at all. If I had known this, I would not have booked this excursion for myself – I would have picked the easy panoramic drive.
I opted to stay behind while Andy did the walk.
More bad news: there really wasn’t anything else to see or do. Apparently the purpose of the excursion was to do this walk down to a viewing point. This was not even remotely clear from the description.
Good news: I did manage to toddle up a steep hill where I did see some beautiful views:
Bad news: Many people had booked the excursion expecting to see puffins. Puffin season is long gone (April – July). They are all out to sea now for the winter. Andy said they hardly saw any birds at all. We did see a kestrel trying to catch some fish just before it was time to get back on the bus.
Andy had different views of the same thing I saw, but photos really don’t due the views justice:
And also an ancient (several thousand years) showing evidence of human habitation.
Of course, photos can’t really show the how stunning the views were from where Andy wa
Ah well, you win some and you lose some.
This is as close as we were going to get to a puffin:
We went back to the ship – fortunately, a relatively short drive. Andy had another excursion in the afternoon: Holyhead Trail, which is a hike through the town of Holyhead (pronounced “holly-head”).
The hike turned out to be not too exciting, but here are a few highlights.
This is the “Excalibur” – a platform used to do maintenance on the wind turbines out at sea:
The tour visited the Holyhead Fort. The fort’s walls are from Roman times.
This is the first church built in Holyhead
This church replaced that one:
While Andy was off on his walk, I ran the laundry, wrote a couple of blogs, retrieved our passports (they were collected until after Dublin), and listened to the port talk for tomorrow.
Tomorrow: Belfast {and I’m hoping the “moderate” excursion goes better.}
Maryland Meshugas 