Trip to St Fagans

When my Mum and I made plans for us to go to Wales there was only really one place that I wanted to visit. I’d been there about eighteen years before and loved it so when I discovered that it was just down the road from my Mum’s I put in my request. Please can we visit St. Fagans.

St. Fagans is a museum of buildings, basically. They have buildings from all over Wales from various different time periods. It has all sorts of houses and other historical buildings which have been removed from the place they were originally built, then painstakingly moved brick-by-brick, to St. Fagans and reconstructed. They’re also furnished with period-appropriate furniture so when you walk around you can really get a sense that you’re stepping back in time.

We met up with my aunt, uncle and cousin and I took exactly two photos there, neither of which were of any of the buildings. They were of a pig with its head in a tub.

Pigs were something of a theme in Wales since one of my first photos when I arrived were of Smiley Pig and Ugly Pig who live next door to my Mum’s house.

I was reluctant to take photos in the buildings because I’m never sure if you’re supposed to when you’re in old buildings (and many of them were too dark for anything to look too good) and it was pretty wet and drizzly while we were out, weather which I usually avoid using my camera in. Next time I go back, hopefully it’ll be in the summer and I’ll be able to take loads of nice photos of all the old buildings.

My favourite building was probably St Fagans Castle which I don’t think I’d been in before. I got a definite ‘Downton Abbey’ vibe from the place. I couldn’t help but imagine living in a place like that. I think I’d rather have been one of the family members, instead of a servant!

They’ve also got a row of houses which are designed to show the changes in lifestyle over the course of about a hundred years. All of the houses have the same basic configuration but you can see how people’s lives changed, books became more prominent, photos started appearing on the walls, electricity started to be used, as well as the differences in the gardens. Right at the end of the row is a pre-fab house which you can nosy in and walk around. I quite liked the pre-fab. I could quite happily have lived in one of those.

Part of the reason I took a photo of the pig up there was because, aside from the row of houses, the only other building I could remember with any clarity was a pig pen. I found it right after we came out of our first building! I love that for nearly twenty years I’ve been carrying around this memory of a round stone pig pen and I was able to go back and find it again.

It’s definitely somewhere that I want to go back and visit again in the future. And next time I’ll take my camera to actually take photos with.