A Fresh Start

Sandwiched between visits to residential homes and to see Dad, the camera was busy.

Care home No.1. Local. Very nice. Didn’t smell of wee. In fact, very pleasant.

St Andrews Major’s church was en route to care home No. 2. I think there’s an ancestor or two buried there somewhere - I have a vague recollection of trying to find the grave many, many years ago.

I don’t know if you can make it out, but the gravestone in the first photo (yes, there is a grave there) starts “In loving memory …” By the overgrown nature of the plot, it would seem the memory wasn’t all that loving after all. I hope it’s not ‘ours’. I noticed on leaving that the present vicar is the wonderfully named “Huw Rhydderch”. There’s lovely, isn’t it?

Care Home No. 2. A bit ‘hospitally’, if you know what I mean. Wasn’t Care Home No.1 nice?

I had plenty of time to kill before visiting the third home, so I took a detour down to the Penarth end of the Cardiff Bay barrage.

What? No, it’s quite safe - I’m preening, not mooring

Care Home No. 3: Wasn’t Care Home No.1 nice?

After Dad tired of my company I started to head off back to the house but got drawn, instead, to the other end of the barrage. Now I remember the bottom of Bute Street as an area you’d think twice about wandering alone but - as you may have seen in Doctor Who - it’s all turned out rather pleasant.

I parked near the Norwegian Church, which is now an art gallery. I was sooooo close to getting that skareboarded completely in the frame, dangnabbit! From there, I wandered over to look at the lightship - I know it’s a different angle for the bow shot but I think it works - before heading over towards the Assembly building. I know what I was trying to do with the merry-go-round shot but really should have used my ND filter to cut down the light. Far too washed out.

Outside the Millenium Centre there’s a large mirrored water feature with rather interesting reflections - I had to move about to find an angle where I was being reflected back at myself for the first shot. It’s an odd feeling to stand directly in front of a mirror and not see your reflection in it, I can tell you. By now my throat was as dry as the Gobi desert (mmmmm … dessert) so I treated myself to a “99″. With sauce. Mmmmmm … red sauce.