DAY 75-76 - Chester

We have arrived at the 18th country of our travels. Saying farewell to Ireland we hopped on a ferry at Dun Laoghaire and just over three hours later we arrived at Holyhead. During this ferry ride Abby checked her emails and discovered that the bank had put a hold on her credit card. This was worrying to her. She managed to call on a pay phone when we reached Holyhead. Turns out she had been ROBBED!!! Thats right 6,ooo big ones had been taken from her account to an online account the day before. The fraud department rang her soon after on her cellphone and after 15mins of questions they pointed out that she was not liable for any of the money. Whew. Some tricky logistical decisions had to be made like where could they send a new card and she needed to sign a disclaimer then send it back to NZ so they could investigate. Thank you to Nicola J in London who provided an address. Anyway on we had to go victims of crime or not..

We took a train to Chester and we met by the very hospitable Sue Buck.

Without taking no as an answer Sue purchased bus tickets and we made our way from Chester, England across the border into Wales to Sue's home. Sue made us very welcome and we were very spoilt during our stay especially as Sue had a piano much to Kath and Nicole's joy.

The next day Abby spent the morning with Sue, taking a hospital shop trolley around the Wrexham hospital. Sue volunteers her time at the hospital shop once a fortnight. Her usual helper was away and Abby was the new recruit. She spent most of the time trying to understand the "Welsh accent" , figuring out English money and extending her knowledge about the range of British confectionery. She also got to say hello to Amelia a five hour old little baby.

Sue took us to the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct and Canal, this was pretty awesome. The view from the top of the Aqueduct was really nice. We watched the long boats cruise down the canals.

We also tried a little canal locking of our own, and yes the other small children had to wait until we had finished our turn.

We continued on up the valley and came to Llangollen which is where Eisteddford 2010 was held. The Eisteddorf is an international choir competition, unfortunately we were too late to see any of the competition but after talking to a couple of nice gentlemen we got shown around the venue and stood on the stage where it all took place.

Our third day with Sue was spent in and around Chester. We took the bus into town had a look around. The city is surrounded by walls and buildings have quite a roman influence.

In the afternoon we went to the park and watched Shakespeares Much Ado About Nothing in an outdoor theatre. The actors were very amusing and it was easy to get caught up in the story and forget we where we were.

Being so cultural had made us hungry, that and it was dinner time. So we headed back into Wales and to a pub to met Sue's son Martin (who we had heard lots about) and his friend Dom (to provide him back up from women overload). Dom was a wealth of stories and funny conversation, we had a most enjoyable evening.