When the toddlers came to stay, we set off to raid the Castle

The crew's parents (also known as "The Toddlers" for reasons that it would take too long to explain here) came to stay in sunny - yes it was - Penarth for a few days. This was our trigger to go and explore Cardiff Castle properly and we are pretty pleased that we did so.

The exterior of the old castle keep is impressive:

The exterior of the other buildings perhaps less so but elegant all the same:

However, once you get inside and see what the Bute family did to turn it into a "summer residence" you realise just how much money they made from the coal export business. For images of their main house, on the island of Bute called Mount Stuart, see 2013 visit post

Here is the children's room, with images of children's tales around the walls. Recognise Little Red Riding Hood in the picture? How she got to ride the wolf is beyond us though:

The large formal dining room is rather special and is now used to host visiting dignitaries from around the world (and the less than dignified visiting politicians too):

The fireplaces didn't escape the ornate treatment either:

and the ceilings were astounding:

Even the cafe in the grounds was impressive offering good carrot cake. Regular readers will know what a critical component of our happiness that is. Overall a great place to visit and do that "wide open mouth gaping in awe" thing.

On the way back, the iPad king (aka the crew's father who is ever so slightly addicted to his) took this panorama of the marina and Cardiff bay and the serious boat spotters might find our Nordhavn in there somewhere, sitting on a hammerhead mooring (for the non boating types, that is the end of the pontoon):

What next? Well, we had a trundle around the bay area to check out all the "systems" again and luckily everything worked OK. Even the singing wing engine alarm was quiet but we have to admit that we have no idea what we did that finally fixed it.....

There are some more "bits and bobs" to do before we head off cruising again, as you would expect, but nothing that would stop us leaving here, hopefully in a week or so. All weather dependent of course, but more of that in the next post. We have to keep you reading this stuff somehow.