Hay on Wye, the town of books, is twinned with Timbuktu and was declared an independent kingdom by a man named Richard Booth. He also declared himself the king, and currently lives in the town castle, which is also a bookshop. Hay has over thirty bookshops including a converted cinema that is home to over 300'000 second hand books.
We had a great night drinking with the locals in some of the real ale pubs around Brecon. I found myself in quite a heated game of Quoits. My team mate was Mick, to tell you the truth i can't remember if we won or lost, although that probably means the latter.
Brecon has a Cathedral with a cafe. Thats all i have to say. Its a nice enough place, we missed the jazz festival by a couple of days which would have brought some life to the town i suspect. The whole place seemed strangly empty, despite the campsites being relatively full. Perhaps we were looking in the wrong places.
According to the legend the original bridge was built by the Devil. He built the bridge in return for the first living soul to cross. An old woman sacrificed her dog by luring it onto the bridge first with a loaf of bread, thus thwarting the Devil and saving herself. The old woman soon died of natural causes, but because she was guilty of such a selfish act, she was rejected by St Peter at the Pearly Gates and can still be heard in the echos of the bridge screaming from the seventh layer of Hell.
This is Martin Rhodes with his metal detector on Barmouth beach. Martin has been detecting metal for 42 years. I asked him if he had ever found any treasure, he said he had never found anything considered treasure under the treasure act, but put together over the years he has found more than enough to get by on. Roman coins, arrow heads, jewellry, not to mention all the lost cash. "I'm going to finish off for the day now, see if any kids have left me any pounds."
We spent the night at Barmouth beach playing Hillbilly Darts and watching the tide come in. It were loverly.
