Monty the Motorhome thought he was taking root at Hillend, but today we’ve moved on and now are on the Caravan Club site at Tredegar, which is just outside Newport, which itself is not too far from Cardiff.
This morning when we left the Hillend campsite there were only five tents left. There is something melancholy about seeing a vibrant bustling site suddenly change to one of deathly stillness, even though we much prefer the latter. However it was time to go and we sped down the M4 to Tredegar.
The campsite is on the Tredegar estate, which is now managed by the National Trust. The main attraction is Tredegar House, a mansion owned by the Morgan family since Tudor times. This family have quite a history (ill-fated marriages, riotous parties, dark arts, war heroism and animal menageries are just some of the tales), however the last two generations spent the family fortunes on the high life and by the early 1950’s the place passed out of the Morgan family.
We had some very enthusiastic guides as we toured the building. Without bidding they launched into tales of the the various branches of the family and were really interesting to listen to. We left wondering if our own family descended from any scions of this exuberant lot - just because of the surname, not the characteristics!
While the mansion is the main attraction there are also some gardens, which were pleasant to wander round in the sunshine. One interesting part was the mineral garden - a parterre with contrasting colours and textures.
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| The Mineral Garden. The black is some sort of cinder, the white is seashells, the brick red and light tan are sand |
Tomorrow the weather is due to start breaking down, so we will be heading home. There will be no post, unless we stop off somewhere interesting.
Note: posted on May 17th as we ran out of internet yesterday and decided not to purchase any additional top-up for just one day.
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