René Wagner

A lot has happened since my last entry. I visited Salisbury and Stonehenge, my Erasmus stay in Cardiff officially ended, I went back home via London on a flight that felt like magic due to the sun setting while we were above the clouds, and last but not least I'm in the early stages with another robotics project at my home university in Bremen.

Unfortunately getting the latter started didn't leave much time for anything else, but things are looking promising now, so I'm taking a bit of a break tagging and uploading photos and should have some slightly more detailed blog entries ready soon.

Tempus fugit. Or so they say. My Erasmus stay here in Cardiff is about to end and, between preparing for my departure and planning all the stuff I'll need to do once I'm back home, I'm traveling around a bit to see places I haven't been to yet.

Yesterday, I spent the afternoon in Roath Park, a Victorian style park in the north of Cardiff featuring a large artificial lake with many swans and all sorts of other birds, as well as botanical and rose gardens. I found it to be a great place to relax. Some impressions are below, have a look at the complete photo set for more.

Between this semester's second last and last exams I had almost a week of time, so I took a Saturday afternoon off and went to Barry Island again. Barry Island is just a 30 minutes train ride from Cardiff, so this is a great way of escaping the city.

One of the main Barry Island attractions is Barry Island Pleasure Park with all sorts of fun rides.

The reason why I went there, however, was the beach and the sea. It was a rather grey and windy day, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. Note the sand "flying" over the beach.

While climbing alonside the cliffs I noticed a number of tiny but beautiful flowers that I wouldn't have expected in such a location.

Watching the waves crash onto the rocks had a very relaxing and refreshing effect. Refreshing in more than one way... I got slightly wet right after the following shot.

I then went on to the pebbles beach of Cold Knap. I don't know whether these pebbles occur there naturally, but it gave the place an interesting atmosphere. Unfortunaly, the photos don't do the brilliant light justice...

I had originally planned to stay there and wait for the sunset, but the high tide had blocked the way I got there (along the beach). Not knowing how long it would take me to find an alternative route I decided to go back early. I still saw the sun approach the horizon over Barry Island Pleasure Park

and the actual sunset later over Barry which marked the end of a wonderful day.

I arrived back in Cardiff for the final stint of my Erasmus stay at Cardiff University last weekend. The journey was uneventful and I even had a bit of time in London for another brief visit to Buckingham Palace. If you are wondering about the barriers in some of the photos, those were for the London Marathon which took place the following day.

I also managed to make it inside Cardiff Castle this week! It only took me some 7 months ;) Personally, I liked the Norman Keep best (see the photo below), but the castle is also interesting if you're into gold covered rooms and all sorts of other luxuries.

I've kept this very low profile for a long time as it wasn't clear whether things would work out as planned until the very last minute. But now it's official: I'm in Cardiff where I will be studying at Cardiff University for the next two semesters as part of the Erasmus Programme.