Tuesday, October 06, 2009

Llys Tryfan RIP

Ok, I have a huge mug of tea next to me, I suggest you do the same, we could be here for a while!

22 years ago today I was 2 days into my first year at university. It was still "Fresher's week" - we started later in those days - and I was aimlessly hanging out of the kitchen window of my Hall of Residence when my attention was drawn to the soft Irish lilt of someone below saying hello and asking what I was up to. As I was (and still am) totally besotted with Bono, the sound of an Irish accent did it for me. "Oh nothing much" I replied, as he disappeared through the door two floors below and into the building. A few minutes later the kitchen door opened and there he was. And 22 years later we are still together.


A couple of weeks ago we went back over to Bangor and it happened to be the day that all this year's students were arriving. We went to the Halls but sadly our Hall (Llys Tryfan) had been knocked down and replaced with a new building of the same size and shape in the same place. This is the old building - my room was on the end, top left, Colin was on the ground floor, 4th window from the right down the side.

and this is it now, it doesn't even have the same name anymore. We talked to one of the wardens and told them we had been there 22 years ago and he agreed to show us inside. It was all very shiny and new, all the bedrooms are now ensuite whereas we had 3 loos to 17 people on each floor! Ah we had some laughs there.

Ok, here are some touristy pictures from London, all the usual stuff.........

Marble Arch


The London Eye


The Victoria & Albert Museum


The ceiling of the cafe in the V&A


and of course Big Ben!

Two days wasn't really enough time, I felt like I missed a lot.

We then went up to The Lake District where we had a lovely little flat right in the middle of Ambleside. On Sunday Colin went and climbed a few of the Wainwrights so I pottered around the village, read and knitted. On Monday we went on the boat along Lake Windermere to Bowness. The weather was a bit grey and drizzly so no photos I'm afraid. Tuesday we drove around looking at the scenery and Wednesday we headed home. I think of the two, I preferred London as there was lots of stuff to do and as I'm not a walker looking at one hill is much like looking at another!

In between the two trips Becca had a Jamie at Home party. She invited all people from knit group so we all knew each other and her mum was the consultant so it was a lovely relaxed evening. I bought some lovely mugs, a matching milk jug, and a new apron!

My ex-work colleague and friend Iain and his wife Helen had their second baby last week. A little girl, a sister to their two year old boy, so congratulations to them. Here's a sneaky peek at something I am making for them.


On our last holiday day we went to see The Invention of Lying starring Ricky Gervais. It was okay I guess, a couple of funny moments and a great cameo from Steven Merchant and "Barry from Eastenders".

Well I think I'll stop there. I do have knitting stuff to show but I'll put that in a separate post.

4 comments:

Sarah said...

Love the story of how you met - sounds like two great trips

The Bumbles said...

I'm sorry - you had kitchens in your dorm?! What luxury. That is a very sweet picture of the two of you. I find it romantic that you went back to the original "scene of the crime" ;0)

Nina said...

Oh, that's sweet! I love your story. Kinda funny how they knocked down the building and rebuilt it (almost) just the same. How could you tell it wasn't the original? ;)

Thanks for "all the usual" photos. The personal eyewitness view is always the best. :)

Unknown said...

Aww this blog made me a little sad... I lived in Llys Tryfan and found your post by googling it when i was having a sad moment...I loved those halls :(