Woke up at seven, interested in hearing the morning reports on the missile strike on the Polish side of the border with Ukraine. US and NATO intelligence are saying it's not a missile sent by Russia, but one of the Ukrainian anti-aircraft versions of the same Russian weapon gone off course and crashing the wrong side of the border. President Zelensky is denying this, pointing to the hundreds of missiles targeting civilian targets and energy infrastructure, declaring that the Russians have engineered this incident to look like an Ukrainian 'own goal' strike. A forensic investigation of the incident will reveal whether or not he was wise to speak out so quickly on this occasion.
I drove up to St Peter's Fairwater after breakfast to celebrate the Eucharist with two dozen faithful, and join their coffee morning afterwards. They are raising funds to support a project that works with street children in Colombia, founded by a Welsh priest who started as an Anglican and then became a Roman Catholic. Before he was ordained, he was travelling through Latin America, and lost all his possessions to thieves while staying at an hotel in Medellin. With no means of paying he was ejected by hotel staff which refused to help him. He was looked after and helped by some of the street kids of the barrio to contact his family and the consulate to arrange repatriation and never forgot this. Once he was established in ministry he started fundraising and moved to Colombia to start this remarkable work of giving youngsters a chance at life. An amazing story.
As soon as I got home, we packed the car, refuelled it at the big Tesco and then set off for the Gower. We stopped on the outskirts of Mumbles to have a picnic lunch in a car park just behind the beach. Along the bay shoreline is a metalled cycle track linking Swansea with Mumbles. This track was occupied by the Mumbles tramway until 1960. It had the distinction of being the world's first passenger carrying railway, with horse drawn vehicles running from 1807 onwards. In the summer a tourist road-train runs between Swansea and Mumbles on this track. What a difference it would make to congested roads if commuters and shoppers had an electric tram to ride on all year round today.
We reached the Oxwich Bay hotel just after three, checked in and were given key cards to our room in 'Ivy Cottage' five hundred yards up the road from the hotel, a nineteenth century stone building that had been gutted and transformed into six guest rooms with en suite bathrooms. The internal furnishings, stairway and doors were all made of light oak to a very high standard of carpentry. A very pleasant environment in which to spend a couple of nights.
We deposited our bags and went out immediately for a walk up the beach in the last hour of daylight under an overcast sky. Thankfully it didn't rain while we were out although there was intermittent rain through the day and into the evening. The tide was on its way out and we saw several family groups of Dunlin feeding and running through the surf. There were Oystercatchers out there in the distance as well, and we could hear their cry, even though they were hard to spot in fading light. Such sights and sounds make the whole trip worthwhile, even if it were to rain for the rest of our time there.
We had supper in the hotel - veggie lasagne for Clare and vegan three bean chilli stew for me, plus a date and pecan cake with ice cream to follow. Clare went back to Ivy Cottage after the meal and I went for a walk in the dark to the other end of the village. There are no street lights at all now, so as it was overcast and hard to see, I had to be careful. I walked for half an hour and only saw a couple of cars at a distance. It's a familiar place, and I've walked here before in the dark, sometimes under the full moon.
I returned to Ivy Cottage, and an hour later went out with Clare to the hotel to retrieve her medication for injection from the fridge. The night manager agreed to let her do the injection in the hotel lounge with all the doors and curtains shut, rather than traipsing back to our room to do it, and then back again to return the medication to the fridge. He was ever so good about it. All the young staff here are delightful and most helpful.
Then finally, back to our room to settle down for the night. Our bedroom looks out towards the wooded escarpment behind the bay. I wonder if we'll hear owls tonight? I think they're out there.
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