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.

Back in December we spent a weekend in London. On my way home from Cardiff last Saturday, I took the chance to visit central London again. In only about 2.5 hours, I managed to see Victoria Train Station, the Royal Mews, Buckingham Palace, the Victoria Memorial, the gate to Green Park, parts of St. James's Park, Parliament Square with its statues, Big Ben and Westminster Palace (Houses of Parliament) from Parliament Square and from the south bank of the River Thames, the London Eye, St. Margaret's Church, and Westminster Abbey. The weather was somewhat mixed with high winds, rain, snow, and sunshine. The best part of the trip was clearly the walk along the south bank of the River Thames in the sun.

I will definitely be back, with a tripod, a wide angle lens and more time at hand. In particular I'd like to take more night shots and go inside Westminster Abbey.

We visited Bath on March 1st. It was a really beautiful day with lots of sunshine and therefore many opportunities to take pictures. The brilliant light created a very special atmosphere inside Bath Abbey which is hard to capture, but the photo below may give you a rough idea of it. If you get a chance, Bath Abbey is a must visit and I recommend you allow plenty of time to really enjoy the experience - there is so much to discover inside.

The Roman Baths were somewhat disappointing. From an archeological point of view the presentation of the historic site had a rather unprofessional feel to it - many interesting bits were not explained at all or only via an electronic "audio guide" which I found extremely tiresome to listen to. The Hypocaust (underfloor heating system) is probably among the most noteworthy of ancient Roman engineering feats, yet I couldn't find any diagram explaining how it worked or even a mention of it in the "audio guide". It was certainly fun to see pilae stacks (part of a Hypocaust) live, but only because I knew what I was looking at - people around me gave me a rather funny look wondering why I was so excited over a couple of bricks until I explained it all.

From a photographer's point of view, the scaffolding that was basically everywhere was a bit of a show stopper (as can be seen above). Given the hefty admission fee, I believe a warning notice at the entrance would have been the least the museum should have done. On the flip side, it makes for a good reason to visit Bath again and re-do the affected shots.

Just in time before the weather changed (for the worse) we also managed to pay shorts visits to The Circus (pictured above) and the Royal Crescent (below). I particularly liked the trees in the middle of The Circus.

And finally, I love seagulls.

I returned from Amrum where I've spent the past three weeks on Sunday. I didn't have internet connectivity there but I didn't miss that. Here are a couple of reasons why: