𝐁𝐮𝐬-𝐁𝐨𝐨𝐤-𝐁𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐠𝐞 – Cardiff Bus No.13

A friend of mine will be ever so jealous of me catching the No.13 to Drope. He’s been on to me for years saying he is fascinated by the name Drope and one day wants to catch the No.13 there. Wiki tells me ‘Drope is a hamlet in the valley of the River Ely in Vale of Glamorgan, southeast Wales, just beyond the territorial border of western Cardiff’. I took a picture of the bus and sent it to him. There’s one big problem though. The bus doesn’t actually go to Drope. Many years ago I think the bus probably did go there but not anymore. In fact if you look at Google Street View you can see a bus stop in Drope and even an actual bus but the photos are dated 2012. Nowadays the closest you get is Mansell Avenue which leaves you a 15 walk to Drope. So why is the No.13 Cardiff Bus still advertising Drope on it’s headboard? Probably because it would be fairly expensive to change I guess. Being a bit nerdy I asked both an attendant in the bus station and the bus driver whether the bus went to Drope. They looked rather confused/embarrassed, I’m not sure which, but didn’t have an answer.

Before catching the bus I needed a book. I’d had a look around to see what was near the No.13 terminus and spotted the Western Cemetery. I visit Cathays Cemetery on a weekly basis but I think I have only ever been to Western Cemetery once or twice and that was quite a few years ago. I searched to see if there was anyone of note buried there and came across a reference to Mahmood Mattan, the last person to be hung in Cardiff in 1952. In 1998, 45 years after his death, his conviction was quashed. I spotted the was a book, The Fortune Men by Nadifa Mohamed, a non-fiction novel that semi-fictionalises the true story of Mahmood Mattan.

No.13 Cardiff Bus to Drope and Western Cemetery

I looked in the very useful Cardiff Libraries on-line catalogue. It told me they had some eight copies and only two were currently out on loan and that the most convenient one for me to pick up a copy would be Capel i Bawb library at the Infirmary. What a lovely wee library this is, built in a renovated hospital chapel. I was there some ten minutes after it opened, armed with the Dewey classification. Could I find it? No. Luckily there was a librarian on duty who said it was best to ignore the Dewey classification and have look in the fiction section. I suppose that made sense in hindsight considering the book was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 2021.

The No.13 took me out along Cowbridge Road, over the River Ely and then into Ely itself. The Halloween decorations had come down and the Christmas decorations starting to appear.

Western Cemetery is large and opened in 1936. There is a war graves section, a fenced off Jewish section, a Greek orthodox section and a couple of Muslim sections. I didn’t have a location for the Mattan grave but I did have a picture and guessed it was in the Muslim section. It took about 30 minutes to locate. On his headstone is inscribed Killed by Injustice. I took a few minutes to reflect on that.

Mahmoud Mattan grave at Western Cemetery, Cardiff

I walked out the other end of the cemetery and onto Cowbridge Road West, past the milestone and found the Café Eighty Nine in The Range. The Christmas shoppers were out in droves but I found a table, ordered a brie and cranberry panini and pot of tea and settled down to read. The Fortune Men is very well written, lovely prose, good social history of Cardiff but a harrowing story at the same time.

Milestone Cowbridge Road Cardiff and The Range Cafe

Catch up on past Bus-Book-Beverage adventures.

𝐁𝐮𝐬-𝐁𝐨𝐨𝐤-𝐁𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐠𝐞 – Cardiff Bus No.11

I was lucky. Somebody had already given me a heads up (more about that phrase later). Cardiff Bus operate forty two No.11 services each day and all but one of those go to Pengam Green. The one exception is the 15.40 from Hayes Bridge Road which goes not to Pengam Green but to Wentloog Business Park. This Bus-Book-Beverage adventure was therefore done over two days, the first to Wentloog Business Park and the second to Tesco in Pengam Green.There no end to the fun this challenge offers.

First things first and time to find a book for the journey. The fact this one started next to the Central Library was ideal. I popped in and grabbed the first book I saw. The fact it is about sheep is purely coincidental. It is extracts from a diary about life on an organic farm in Gloucestershire. It’s a good and insightful read into the tough life of being a farmer and endeared more sympathy in me that the interviews I see on TV news with farmer union officials.

The No.11 took me through Adamsdown, Splott and Tremorfa, areas I am used to researching via my involvement with Roath Local History Society. It may not seem obvious these days but the old parish of Roath used to go all the way down to the sea and included these areas, hence my interest.

The bus got to Rover Way and swung eastwards past the Secret Station sculpture by Eilis O’ Connell, now just a shadow of its former self and looking rather forlorn. I wonder how many people accidentally find themselves trapped on the No.11 heading out towards Wentloog on a daily basis. We drop a few shift workers off to work and pick up quite a few more on the return journey.

Secret Station sculpture by Eilis O’ Connell in the days it was illuminated and emitted steam

The next day I caught another No.11, this time to Pengam Green and had my lunch in Tesco. I was taken aback – even Tesco’s café have digital order boards these days. I just about coped. I had the Mac & Cheese or as we used to call it when I was growing up, macaroni cheese. It barely covered the bottom of the shallow dish and I was questioning the value for money but then ten minutes after finishing it I felt stuffed. The dish looked like and indeed evidently had the properties of that yellow expanding foam you get at DIY stores.

To walk off lunch I went for a stroll around Tremorfa Park. It is built, like much of Tremorfa, on the site of an old airfield, Pengam Moor. And what an interesting history the airfield has. It was where the airship pioneer Ernest Willows first built his airships. It was the base for Wales’s only operational RAF Squadron, the 614 Squadron, albeit only for a short period of time. And it had commercial flights operating here both before and after WWII, before Cardiff Airport relocated out to Rhoose.

614 Squdron monument Tremorfa Park and map dating from ~1945 with some early Tremorfa streets laid down.

Right, returning to that phrase ‘heads up’. I first came across it some twenty or thirty years ago which working with people who used to adopt this emerging American-like lingo, mainly to hide the fact that they didn’t have anything of substance to say. It was all ‘on the same page’, ‘thinking outside the box’, ‘touching base’, ‘leverage’ and ‘low hanging fruit’. ‘Heads up’ in hindsight seems obvious now; someone says something and it is so important that you need to raise your head to listen to them. For some reason however I had only ever heard the phrase ‘they’ve got their head up their arse’, so when people told me they were giving me a ‘heads up’ I naturally assumed it was a shortened version of that phrase. Think about that next time someone says ‘heads up‘ to you. Picture it and try not to laugh.

Millennium Stadium, Dr Who tardis and Merchant Navy Memorial art at Tremorfa Park

Catch up on past Bus-Book-Beverage adventures.

𝗕𝘂𝘀-𝗕𝗼𝗼𝗸-𝗕𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗲- Cardiff Bus No.9

The Cardiff Bus No.9 goes from Heath Hospital all the way down to Sports Village via the city centre. I had a cunning plan. I was going to catch it outside Cathays Library. Every Tuesday morning a group of us go for a walk around Cathays Cemetery and take it in turns to talk about either some of the nature or some of the ‘residents’. I find it fascinating to learn about the lives of the people buried there. Today we had a Victorian coal exporter and a newly installed war graves headstone to discuss.

After that I popped into the library to do some research of my own into the portrait artist Margaret Lindsay Williams. She really was very skilful and painted many Royal family portraits as well as an American President. A lot of online material states she was born in Barry. She certainly did live there from a young age but I wanted to check and ordered her birth certificate. It turns out she was a local girl born in Gordon Road, near the Mansion House. One of her paintings that’s getting press attention at present is of a ward at Cardiff Royal Infirmary.

Cardiff Royal Infirmary painting by Margaret Lindsay Williams

So after Cathays Cemetery and a half hour research in Cathays Library it was time to embark on my next Bus-Book-Beverage adventure. The No.9 route operates five buses each hour so there’s never long to wait for the next bus. I must say there’s something rather unnerving about a bus that starts at the hospital and then heads to the cemetery. Sometimes they run double-deckers on this route and it’s fun to sit upstairs and look at streets like Crwys Road and City Road from angles you don’t normally see them. Not today though. Our single decker took me into town then a 5-10 minute wait in Westgate Street while it adjusted to its timetable times and then we set off again through Grangetown. The wide avenue of Clive Street looked great today with its Victorian housing. It was then into the much more modern mix of retail and low-rise flats before we arrive at Sports Village and the swimming pool.

I had my mind and stomach set on one thing today, an almond chocolate croissant from Tŷ Melin Bakery. They are enormous and probably not intended to be eaten by a single person, at least not in a single-sitting. I walk down to the Marina and immediately spot the flaw in my plan. It’s raining heavily and they have no indoor seating and their outdoor tables have no cover. But when a man has his heart set on something it’s hard to change his mind and I resist the temptation to go to the café/bar next door which does have indoor seating.

Armed with my almond chocolate croissant and cappuccino I exit the bakery in search of some shelter. No sooner do I get out than I find a dropped purse. What is it about this challenge that leads me to keep finding things? So far I have found a mobile phone in a Cardiff Bay pub, a passport in the Bus Station and now a purse. I could have a whole new identity by now. I feel an idea for a novel coming on. I hand the purse into the bakery and then find the only sheltered place in sight, a miserable entrance to an underground car park. I say miserable but for some reason it has a Bayscape sculpted stone etched with a flying bird. What miserable weather but the croissant and coffee tasted delicious! They were gone before I remembered to take a photo.

Determined to get at least a bit of exercise on this adventure I put up the umbrella and headed over the pedestrian bridge. There’s some interesting artwork over here. In the middle of the roundabout near Tesco is a representation of the transmitter Marconi used for his first radio transmission from nearby Lavernock Point to Flat Holm island in 1897. Nearby is the sculpture Slate Sails by Howard Bowcott and one I rather like though it looked bleak today.

In the end I admit the weather defeated me and I head back to the bus stop. It’s over an hour journey back so I settle down with my book, another good find in a book exchange. It’s Ticket to Ride by Tom Chesshyre, a man who goes on a series of train journeys around the world. First he tries to get an insight into people’s fascination with trains by standing on the platform in Crew and talking to the train enthusiasts. It’s very amusing and I can see the irony in that, being sat on a bus for no particular reason. In the second chapter he goes to Kosovo with Ffestiniog Travel Co. Another coincidence occurs. He tells the reader how Ffestiniog Travel Co originates in Porthmadoc, home of the Ffestiniog Railway and then goes on to explain a bit about the history of that railway, how it started as a slate transport railway from the quarries at Blaenau Festiniog to the port of Porthmadoc. The coincidence is that I’m in the middle of preparing a talk about how that railway put my g-g-g-grandfather out of business as he used to transport the slate down the river by boat before the railway was constructed.

The bus stops near Ikea and two ladies struggle on, one armed with a large peddle bin and one with an artificial Christmas tree. Two stops later we hit trouble. The doors won’t close. The driver tries everything ranging from turning everything off and on again to a well timed shoulder barge. They reluctantly shut. He tests them again but no luck. I’m not worried though. We have everything we need on board; a peddle bin for, how can I put this delicately… waste, and if we are here for an extended period, a Christmas tree. The driver calls HQ. Already there are shouts from the back of the bus “Do we need to get off Drive?”

The abandon bus command is given just as the next No.9 pulls in and the next stage of the adventure begins. I jump off the bus in town to take a picture of our new bus but it is such a grey and dismal afternoon it hardly seems worth it. It’s only 2pm but cars already have their headlights on. I regularly wipe the window free of condensation with my forearm in order to get a view. We get to the hospital and my plan is to stay onboard back down to Crwys Road to complete the route.

Cardiff Bus No.9 – a miserable day on St Mary Street

As a consequence of our broken down bus and wet weather means this bus quickly gets full. The nurses heading home at the end of their shift occupy the back of the bus whilst the out-patients with their crutches, bandages and onward referrals are at the front of the bus. I move forward for fear of getting trapped at the back. Top marks to the driver for his communication skills. “Please move to the back of the bus unless you are getting off at the next couple of stops”, he shouts. Vehicles are breaking down all over the place. We squeeze past a car on the railway bridge on Crwys Road refusing to start. It’s time to get out and head home and dry out.

Catch up on past Bus-Book-Beverage adventures.

𝗕𝘂𝘀-𝗕𝗼𝗼𝗸-𝗕𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗲- Cardiff Bus No.8

I was early for my No’8 Cardiff Bus to Cardiff Bay via Grangetown so went for a wander around Central Square. It’s a dangerous time of year to dawdle around there as you may get speared in the head, not by Cupid’s arrow but by a ripened seed pod from what looks to be a Catalpa bean tree of some sort. I won’t complain though. I’ll leave that to the many others who moan about the lack of greenery in Central Square and continuously mention the words ‘Why don’t the Council…….’ in their social media posts. That reminds me. There must be a huge opportunity awaiting for anyone who can develop a Google Extension or alike that filters out posts containing the word ‘Council’.

Catalpa bean tree in Cardiff Central Square

I still had time for another find before I caught the bus, this time a mislaid passport left on a bench in the bus station. I pictured someone on the way to the airport and barred from boarding their flight without their passport. This one however was battered with ripped pages and more likely used for ID purposes that international travel. I handed it in to one of the attendants. These finds are getting a regular occurrence. It was a mobile phone when I was on the No.6 route.

I like the No.8 route. Instead of going direct to Cardiff Bay from the centre of Cardiff it does a sort of slingshot type route through the multi-cultural community of Grangetown. I got off part way and visited Grange Gardens, one of the smaller but still splendid Cardiff Victorian parks. It has been modernised with an up-to-date playground and five-a-side football pitch but still has relics of the past in the form of a war memorial, bandstand and not forgetting the park caretaker’s shelter complete with Cardiff motif above the door. In 1938 an inventory was made of the contents of the shelter and it included pruning saw, axe (felling), a set of drain rods and kettle (copper).

I went into the Pavilion in search of a bite to eat and a beverage. It was a hive of activity. There’s a lot of community initiatives going on in here and a pleasant atmosphere. I had a seasonal biscoff hot chocolate and cheese and chutney toasty. The menu appeared to comprise of three type of cheese toasty: cheese and jalapeno jam, cheese and chutney and 3-cheese toasty. I was tempted to ask what their signature dish was but thought better of it. Bet it included cheese.

My book today was ‘The People on Platform 5’ by Clare Pooley. I must admit I had picked it up in error in a charity shop. I thought it was going to be travel book but it’s actually a novel. When I discovered this I feared it may be chic-lit but I’m halfway through and no chicken has appeared nor fowl of any sort. Actually, it’s pretty good read, very funny, about a group of people on commuter train who break the rules of commuting and start talking to each other. My only disappointment is there’s no mention of the types of trains e.g. are they loco-hauled or multiple-units?

Biscoff Hot Chocolate and Clare Pooley The People on Platform 5

I still had time after lunch for a walk around the streets Grangetown with its Victorian schools and churches. I even went down to the Taff embankment and had a view back up the river towards the Principality Stadium in the distance.

I then rejoined the No.8 which took me down to its terminus at Cardiff Bay and after a five minute scamper around the area and hopped back on the same bus to bring me back to town.

Click here to see more Bus-Book-Beverage adventures.

𝗕𝘂𝘀-𝗕𝗼𝗼𝗸-𝗕𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗲- Cardiff Bus No.4

Somewhere in Cardiff Bus, hidden away in a dusty office, there is probably a person whose job it is to plan the routes and times of their busses. Armed with maps, survey results, shift patterns and other important information like where their Nan lives, they conjure up the timetables we know and love. In order to justify their existence they repeat that process every couple of months in response to changing demographics and the latest social media furore. Somehow out of all that must have dropped the No.4 route and timetable. It runs from the Cardiff Bus depot on Sloper Road to the Cardiff Bus Exchange but only early morning and in the evenings. I know not why.

Tea-time isn’t when you normally find me in town. I’m more liky to be found watching Pointless shouting Tuvalu at the screen. The city centre was a lot more busier than I expected. Office workers and early evening revelers were dining or partaking in two for the price of one cocktails.

In the Cardiff Bus Interchange the No.4 appeared on the information boards – it wasn’t a phantom imaginary bus. It also told me however that some of the subsequent No.4 services had been cancelled and I had less time in Leckwith that I thought.

Cardiff Bus No.4 at Cardiff Bus Interchange

When the No4 appeared it was in disguise, painted in 57/58 livery. I wasn’t the only one making the trip out of town. The disadvantage of nigh time bus riding is the views out of the windows are restricted. By the time we got to the Bus Depot I was the only passenger on board. After a quick check with the drive regarding the pickup point for the return journey I headed to the Capital Shopping Park, passing the Cardiff City Stadium and Glamorgan Archives on the way.

I had planned to go to the Sand Piper pub for tea but was my time was now more restricted I visited Nando’s. Needless to say that without my minder present I caused chaos, ordering my food for the wrong table assignment. I fancied a burrito and although there was a heading entitled ‘Burgers, Burritos and Wraps’ I failed to find one so ordered a wrap. What a disappointment. It looked like it had been run over by the bus I had just been on and was dwarfed by the plate.

My grandfather from North Wales served in Mesopotamia in WWI and luckily survived. I didn’t even know with what regiment until a few years ago when I realised such details are engraved on the side of the medals. Apart from that there is the fob watch chain with a 1917 half rupee attached which he always wore which probably came from an Indian soldier he fought alongside though I don’t know the story behind it. The only story passed down the family was that when they stood guard outside the tents containing POWs that spoke Welsh to prevent giving away information to the enemy. I guess that was probably unnecessary as the enemy troops probably didn’t speak English either.

Curious to know more about the war in the Middle East in WWI a friend has lent me book detailing the events. It’s a dense read and one for dipping in and out of but highlights immense losses on both side and atrocities of war. The Royal Welsh Fusiliers only get one mention which hit home to me the numbers involved.

The napkin in Nando’s poignantly read ‘We Served, You Ate’.

I dashed back to the bus stop outside the Cardiff Bus Depot and dead on time a No.4 came along and took me back to town.

It was still quite early so rather than heading home I went to see if there were any tickets left for the Ye Vagabonds gig at The Gate, an up an coming Irish Folk band. There were indeed though I had missed the support and ten mins of the Ye Vagabonds. They took pity on me and let me in free of charge. My hearing is too poor these days to hear the lyrics or between-song banter but a good way to cap off the evening, oh and meet my wife.

Click here to see more Bus-Book-Beverage adventures.

𝗕𝘂𝘀-𝗕𝗼𝗼𝗸-𝗕𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗲 – Cardiff Bus No.7

“Do you fancy a trip to Penarth?” I asked my wife last week. She told me she did and even when I told her we’d be going on the bus, the long way round, she was still keen. I’m guessing the fact she’d never caught a bus from the newish Cardiff Bus Interchange that made it sound tempting.

There are buses which go a fairly direct route to Penarth but the No.7 isn’t one of them. It weaves it’s way around Grangetown, diverts up to Llandough Hospital, before weaving again through the streets of Cogan and finally arriving in Penarth almost an hour after starting off.

You need to be a calm and skilful driver to tackle No.7 route. It goes up and down narrow suburban streets where just one badly parked car could mean the end of the journey. The houses of Grangetown were adorned with Halloween decorations. I pretended not to be scared and Margaret told me to stop hiding under the seat.

The bus stopped in Llandough Hospital and the driver turned the engine off and got off. He disappeared into the hospital, I’m guessing either for a pee or very quick prostate examination appointment.

We arrived in Penarth and were met with rain. That’s wasn’t in the forecast. We walked up to St Augustine’s church. I was keen to find a few graves I heard were here such as the grave of Samuel Arthur Brain, the founder of Brains Brewery. Brains SA beer is named him.

Grave of Samuel Arthur Brain, St Augustine’s Penarth

We were also looking for the resting place of the Welsh composer Joseph Parry. I’d recently taken my u3a Slow Train Coming group to see his birthplace in Merthyr Tydfil where we sang his song Myfanwy. After a bit of searching I shouted to Margaret I’d found it. “Liar” she said. “No, honestly, it’s over here” I told her. Turns out she was referring to the lyre, on top of his headstone.

Joseph Parry Headstone at St Augustine Church, Penarth

The rain was hammering down now so we retreated into the café in Belle View Park and treated ourselves to coffee and cake. When we finished Margaret said she was leaving me which was a bit of a shock after all these years and cruel considering I’d just paid for the coffee. It turns out she meant she was off to do a bit of shopping and then planned to take the faster bus back to Cardiff. Lightweight.

Heroic Science at Swansea book by Ronald Rees and Belle View Park Cafe

By now the rain had stopped so I headed down to the seafront via Alexandra Park and onto the pier. This was one of those days where the weather changed every five minutes.

By the time I had walked along the Esplanade and up onto the cliff top the sun was out and temperature soaring. I nipped into the public conveniences to change out of my long johns (let’s be honest, you wouldn’t read a sentence like that from a young blogger).

I sat on a bench on the cliff top and read. Today’s book was one I’d found in a local book-swap thingy and not one I’d ever expect to find there: Heroic Science: Swansea and the Royal Institution of South Wales 1835-1865. The first chapter was all about John Henry Vivian who created the copper industry in Swansea. In those early days it was a filthy process, emitting gasses that withered trees and shrubs and turned the grass yellow. Vivian was wise enough to live upwind in Singleton Abbey, now part of Swansea University. It was especially interesting to me having recently visited Singleton Abbey on a reunion.

When I was there at university I think I only ever went into the Abbey once and that was to register to do a PhD. They looked at the forms and gave them back to me saying they thought it best if I was applying to do a higher degree then I should probably spell ‘research’ correctly and not resurch. Spelling has never been my strong point which together with other traits such as a fascination with lists, like catching buses in numerical order, probably means I deserve a label. I’m however quite happy being called ‘a little bit quirky’.

Anyway, back to John Henry Vivian. The book told me how he tackled the problem of acrid emissions from his factory by setting up a fund with a prize of £1,000 to anyone who could solve the problem. The problem was taken up by famous scientists of the day including Humphry Davy and Michael Faraday. Whilst Davy liked coming to stay at Singleton Abbey to visit the copper works and then partake in social events such as hunting in the Abbey grounds, Michael Faraday found all that rather irksome. My mind went back to our recent tour of the campus and the Abbey and how we were stood in the same room that Michael Faraday and Humphry Davy had once had their evening meals with the Vivian family.

I strolled back to the middle of Penarth along the old railway track before catching the No.7 bus back to Cardiff where the sun set on another bus-book-beverage adventure.

Click here to see more Bus-Book-Beverage adventures.

𝗕𝘂𝘀-𝗕𝗼𝗼𝗸-𝗕𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗲 – Cardiff Bus No.6 Baycar

This is more like the type of bus I anticipated myself catching when I started this challenge. A bus that travels between two significant destinations, Cardiff City Centre and Cardiff Bay, not some out of town industrial estate as was the case with the 1A and 2A or a nighttime journey to the Bus Depot as with the No.4. Here I was mixing in with the late-summer tourists and some Belgium football fans over for the World Cup qualifier game with Wales tonight.

Cardiff Bus No.6 in Cardiff Bus Interchange

I’m guessing Cardiff Bus probably deliberately put one of their most cheerful drivers on this route to give a good impression of the city. I felt like asking him why is the bus called the ‘No.6 Baycar’, when it’s obviously not a car, it’s a bus. And why haven’t the other buses got a name such as ‘miserable-industrial-estate-car’? I didn’t have the heart to ask him.

To wow the tourists the No.6 drops you right outside the Millennium Centre. It’s hard not to be impressed by this slate and copper-fronted building with its giant words in Welsh and English set to confuse many a tourist and even the natives when they discover that the English translation of the Welsh words is different from the English words. I like this area with the Millennium Centre, the Senedd and the Pierhead building. Yes, it not a grand as was at one stage proposed but it’s still good.

Wales Millennium Centre: I must admit I didn’t know until now that the words These, Stones, Horizons, Sing are four words from the end of four lines in a poem.

I’m much less impressed with Mermaid Quay around the corner but this is where I was heading on a mission to see the E.T.Willows clock. I’m thinking of doing a talk on the airship pioneer, Ernest Willows and this was part of my research. The clock is looking a bit battered these days and some bits, notably the gold model airship have gone missing.

The clock’s outer kinetic components that were in sync with the hour hands, include landmark buildings and aeronautical motifs depicting key events in Willow’s life. On the one face the buildings are from Cardiff, and the other face shows buildings from London. Both clocks have a second-hand that has a model of an airship on its tip that used to sweep around fairly quickly. The clock was designed by Andy Hazell.

I’d even bought some Ernest Willows reading material with me in the form of a book called Weekend with Willows about a trip in a balloon in 1924. Willows was a great inventor but a lousy businessman. By 1924 he was broke and making money by taking people on balloon trips. It’s a fascinating account of ballooning. Willows would descend when he was lost and shout to ask passers-by on the ground where he was.

I sat alone on the deck of the Mount Stuart pub, enjoying my pint of Exmoor Dark and imagining myself up there with Willows, floating quietly across the skies over London.

Exmoor Dark and a Weekend with Willows in the Mount Stuart Cardiff

I took a stroll along the boardwalk outside the St David’s Hotel and arrived at the Cardiff Welands, first to enjoy some of the art; Cadair Idris and Ship in a Bottle, and then onto the wooden jetty to look at the birdlife. Much of it moved up the coast towards Newport when Cardiff Bay was flooded after the barrage was built but some decided to stay put (I guess I’m talking about the bird’s ancestors rather than the present generation of waders. No idea how long a duck lives for.)

It was then a few more building to look at on the way back and then a short wait for a No6 Baycar back into the City Centre. A fascinating couple of hours.

Cardiff Bus No.6 Baycar outside the Wales Millenium Centre

Some additional pictures from the trip:

Cardiff Bay Rugby Codebreakers – Billy Boston, Clive Sullivan and Gus Risman that was unveiled in July 2023

Caardiff Bay (L to R): Mermaid Quay, Pierhead Building, Millenium Centre and the Senedd Building

Click here to see more Bus-Book-Beverage adventures.

𝗕𝘂𝘀-𝗕𝗼𝗼𝗸-𝗕𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗲 – Cardiff Bus No.2A

I never imagined when I dreamt up this challenge that it would require getting up early. I naively thought that all busses ran throughout the day and I would be able to pick and choose when I travelled. Who would have thought, apart from a rather mean bus planner, that the last trip for bus 2A is 8.15 in the morning. The 2A is a workers bus that goes out to Wentloog Industrial Estate and a few other industrial estates along the way.

Yesterday I rose to the challenge, rose early that is, for me anyway. I was surprised, though perhaps I shouldn’t have been, that the bus was pretty crowded. Fifty years ago passengers would probably have been reading their newspapers, 25 years ago they’d probably have had a Walkman with headphones. Now it’s all mobile phones and Bluetooth earphones.

We passed through Splott and Tremorfa, picking a few more up, dropping a few off, before heading out to the Wentloog and the Great Point Seren film studios. I kept my eye out for any stars getting off the bus but Russell Crow nor Sigourney Weaver were nowhere to be seen today. The bus terminus is a rather bleak roundabout with no tea wagon in sight.

A 15 minute walk was therefore required up a shaded path to Trowbridge but still no beverage seller in sight so it was another 15 minutes up to Rumney and a trusty Greggs. The sun was out so I walked on to Rumney Hill Gardens and had my breakfast and read.

Breakfast with the Morels in Rumney Hill Gardens

My book for the day was the Morels of Cardiff, that’s the ship owners not the mushrooms. I’m leading the walk around Cathays Cemetery tomorrow. I told them about Philip Morel last time so this week it is his brother Sir Thomas Morel, who was Mayor when Cardiff purchased Cathays Park off the Bute family and had the Town (City) Hall built and later the museum and university.

Rhymney Trail sign in Rumney Hill Gardens. Yes, it took me a while to realise both are spelt correctly.

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𝗕𝘂𝘀-𝗕𝗼𝗼𝗸-𝗕𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗲 – Cardiff Bus No.2

Disaster! How can I possibly catch three busses, all the No.2, on the City Circle route, and forget to take a picture of any of them. I’ve a long way to go before I’m a true busaholic I can tell. Having said that I’ve still got the tickets so if you really want to know what bus numbers they were I can tell you.

The No.2 took me around to the other side of the city where I had a very pleasant time exploring Victoria Park and its history. I learnt about the zoo where they once had Billy the Seal. A vegan sausage roll was had outside the cafe that used to be the public conveniences I think. After another lap of the park my hour was up and time to head home. Another No.2 took me into town, a quick walk around then back on the same No.2 bus to home.

Drinking Fountain, Voctoria Park, Cardiff

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𝗕𝘂𝘀-𝗕𝗼𝗼𝗸-𝗕𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗲. Cardiff Bus No.1A

This challenge is much harder than I imagined it was going to be.

Cardiff Bus 1A goes from Wentloog Business Park into town but only three times day, in the afternoon, coinciding with the finishing times for workers. To make things more difficult for me the bus travels there ‘out of service’ so to catch the 1A I therefore had to somehow get myself there. The answer was to catch a 44 or 45 to Trowbridge and then walk down a dodgy footpath, over the main railway line and onto the industrial estate.

Cardiff Bus 1A route map near Wentloog Business Park

I tried it yesterday and failed. It was a horrible wet day and I got soaked. I managed to get to the 1A bus stop in Wentloog but the bus never turned up. I got even wetter trudging back up to Trowbridge.

My misery was compounded by the fact that I’d picked up a book to read in a charity shop about Peace. The back cover professed it would tell me how to bring about world peace even though I wasn’t a political leader or campaigner. It quickly transpired that the answer being put forward was to pray. Things got worse when I Googled the author, a French Canadian, who had won his fair share of prizes but then had some withdrawn for sexual scandals.

I had it all planned yesterday too. After the bus adventure I still managed to salvage the day and go to a meeting of the Cardiff Scientific Society where Professor Sir Colin Humphreys spoke about ‘Next generation ultra-low-energy consumption 2D semiconductor materials and devices beyond silicon’. This was a very topical lecture given the announcement yesterday about Microsoft investing £ billions in datacenters in UK. To power them we will need more nuclear power stations and still have the most expensive electricity in the developed world. We can only hope that the inventions of Sir Colin Humphreys come to reality, cutting the energy needed to power these datacenters and keep out lights on. I can’t help thinking UK has got the raw end of this trade deal. Once datacenters are built they sit there not employing people but using up massive amounts of electricity. Whereas the US gets a multibillion dollar investment from GSK employing a highly skilled workforce.

Anyway, back to the bus. I tried again today. I binned yesterday’s book and bought a new one. The bus turned up on time and picked up four other people on the industrial estate before we got to Tremorfa where we joined the conventional City Circle route into town.

smartJamima’s Pitchfork at the Great Western Hotel, Cardiff

I headed over to the Great Western, (maintaining the transport theme) and ordered myself a pint of Jemima’s Pitchfork, went upstairs and found a quiet corner for a read of Richard Ayoade’s Ayoade On Top. He has a unique style of humorous writing with a rich vocabulary. I was a third of my way down my pint when my corner got invaded by a group of noisy school children, who had no intention of buying anything. In fairness they were fine, having harmless fun playing a card game. I took my hearing aid out and continued to read.

Richard Ayode On Top and a pint of Jemima’s Pitchfork

I wonder what the next bus adventure will bring me.

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