The Amazing Shrinking Woman

My first two nights in Wales I stayed in the YHA Llanberis hostel, here is their website: http://www.yha.org.uk/hostel/llanberis

I can not say enough amazing things about the people that work there and the location. It may have been a bit tricky to find (due to bad road sign placement) buuuuut we do have to keep in mind I have a poor sense of direction lol. I conversed with the staff a bit more than I normally would have due to my lost luggage debacle (thanks British Airways *rolls eyes*) but they were so friendly I’m glad I did. 🙂

My first full day in Wales I woke up early and was fed a lovely Full Welsh Breakfast, Mmm! I didn’t take my camera with me to breakfast cause uh, who does that? 😉  so I don’t have a picture but a Full Welsh consists of: bacon, sausage, fried egg, baked beans, toast and fried tomato. Because I don’t eat pork I got the vegetarian option which meant no bacon and sausage and instead I was given this batter covered something…I’m still not sure what it was lol I think it was supposed to be a vegetarian sausage option but that’s a guess. It wasn’t good, whatever it was lol The lady serving the food also gave me some sauteed mushrooms, yum! If you didn’t want to pay for breakfast there was free toast, cereal, juice, tea, coffee, yogurt, continental type breakfast foods.

The day prior at the airport British Airways had told me my luggage would be delivered to me the next day between 8a-4p, the hostel reception area and front doors are locked from noon to 5pm daily. If you are staying there you are given a code to unlock the door otherwise you’re outta luck. This meant that I had to stay inside and wait for the delivery of my suitcase all day. It sucked.

I was supposed to be climbing Mt. Snowdon that day but even if reception had been open and I didn’t have to be there to receive the suitcase I still couldn’t have gone because my clothes and water-backpack were in the suitcase. So yeah, no gear for the climb, bummer. The only up side was that the weather was crap that day, and I mean serious storm weather! Pouring rain, strong winds, absolutely brutal. It wasn’t cold though, which was odd. Even though the weather was horrible I was the only person staying in. I waited until a minute after the British Airways call centre opened and called them to discuss the luggage situation, it was once again confirmed I would have my luggage delivered sometime today. I stressed to them that was very important because I was leaving the next morning for a different town and would no longer be in Llanberis to receive the luggage. The lady was nice, said she understood, said she put a rush on it, she said a lot of things which would later prove to be lies, sigh.

The only place in the hostel I could clearly see the driveway from was the dining room so I made some tea, grabbed my backpack and claimed a table.

Where I spent most of my first full day of vacation – exciting huh?

Luckily I had a book, a notebook to write in, a deck of cards and a bottle of water. I also had my ipod if I wanted to listen to music and my ipad if I wanted to play games…no wifi connection sadly but oh well. Oh, and I also had the phone a friend of mine let me borrow. She is from the UK so she had her old blackberry and she let me use it so I wouldn’t have to worry about roaming fees with my phone or finding a converter for the plug, nice huh? 🙂 I found it funny that I used to have a blackberry and for the life of me couldn’t figure out how to do a bunch of different things on that phone, drove me nuts! But at least it gave me a way to call British Airways and get updates on my suitcase lol

While I was writing in my journal I kept looking out the window hoping to see a delivery van, here is what I saw instead…

The driveway

There be horses in that field!

This sheep was baa-ing the whole time I sat inside, it was so cute! and sorta soothing…who knew?

Close up of the sheep. Why? Cause I can lol Sheep are a bit of a novelty to me lol

Around lunch time a girl came in to the dining room and asked if I was staying in all day. I explained why I was stuck inside and she commiserated, said BA is known for losing luggage and when they lost hers it took 4 days to get it back, ack! She then did the nicest thing! She said she was staying in for the next couple of hours so she could stay in the dining room and watch for the delivery if I wanted to go in to town to get some food or walk around or even just to look at things. I was oh-so-grateful! I was going stir crazy just sitting there, plus, I had no food for lunch and the hostel doesn’t serve lunch so I was looking at a loooooon wait till dinner. I left her to keep a look out and I dashed in to town. I didn’t want to take too long, I was paranoid about what if they brought the suitcase but wouldn’t leave it with her cause it wasn’t hers, thoughts like that…so all I did was hit up this super tiny grocery store called SPAR, walk the main street rather quickly then drive back to the hostel. Even though it was a short trip it was nice to get out. The rain had stopped by then and the air was so fresh smelling, it made me want to stay out for longer.

I didn’t get anything fancy but what I got made a nice little meal…

My lunch, a turkey and apple sandwich with the rest of the apple on the side, along with a rice pudding cup, two jaffa cookies and of course tea and diet coke lol

At 4pm on the dot I called BA back since the suitcase was supposed to be delivered by 4pm and it had yet to arrive. I was informed that whoever told me earlier I would get it today was wrong and I wouldn’t get it until the day after or maybe even two days after. Grr! So I spent all day inside waiting for the suitcase and it wasn’t even on the way! I was pissed!

I figured since no way I could miss the suitcase now I might as well go out for a walk. I walked in to town than wandered. I found a slate mine museum type place but didn’t really want to go in. Then I found a little mountain that when I got to the top I found an old castle that used to be a prison, exciting! I’m putting all those pics in the next post, enjoy! 🙂

Tags: British Airways, cuppa tea, food, holiday, Llanberis, sheep, SPAR, UK, vacation, Wales, YHA Hostel Llanberis