Pensarn, Pensarn...

What a journey. We got on multiple trains as of silly o'clock on Saturday morning, having discovered my party earrings had not arrived. The dragons were sound asleep wrapped in their towels and the journey was perfectly planned to the minute - connection after connection made beautifully (I realised I had forgotten my specially bought hat on the second train) and almost pleasant if it weren't for the extraordinary amount of Scouts. In fairness, they were wonderfully behaved and great entertainment for the dragons, whom had a fabulous time watching the humans and out of the window. (Points A through D on the map to see our trip!)

We arrived in Pensarn a couple of minutes late - and couldn't see our taxi. The conductor, just preparing to head off, suddenly said "Is it Abergele you're going to?" We agreed and asked if he knew a taxi number, being as ours hadn't turned up. "Oh

." he says. "This isn't it."

Apparently, the Pensarn the trainline was advertising isn't OUR Pensarn. Our Pensarn is Abergele. In fairness, our Pensarn is big, with a little town (Abergele) just down the road and the inhabitants of our Pensarn didn't even know there was another one! The Pensarn we ended up at was simply a train track with a shelter... There was one house across the road, and some sort of traveller's day centre. That's it. And we were now late for our friends wedding.

Thankfully a lovely girl called Rachel in the Pensarn day centre sorted out a cabbie to take us the 50 miles completely across Wales to the right Pensarn. He was fantastic, and I'd like to thank him and his two little boys who had a bit of a long trip to get us back to Abergele. We got to the Bull Hotel whom kindly let us borrow their phone to call the Black Lion accross the road from the community centre where the reception was being held and let the bride know we hadn't got killed - just delayed by four hours.

The reception was lovely, the bride was delighted to see us, which made my day, Tsam and Kyle had a brilliant time tiring themselves out running around on the grass, taking Wee C for a walk, Rich discovered he didn't like Belgian lager but the cake was just right for him (no marzipan) and I found a yummy carrot, orange and lemon juice goes well with sparkling perry. The bride looked fantastic and the blushing groom was as happy as jam scones. Wee C made me laugh - on receiving and taking a big bite of her very own cake, we asked her what it tasted like. "Hmmm. It tastes like... cake."

We finally got back to the Bull - if you ever end up in Abergele, please do visit the Bull Hotel at the very least. The landlord and his family are lovely souls, the rooms peculiar in shape and with luscious dark wood furniture. Our room had a curved wall that leant in on the one side... We slept in a very comfy, creaky bed and awoke to enjoy a huuuuge cooked breakfast.

We got to the local trainstation and had to wing it from there... F-J on the map. We explained to each conductor the Pensarn-Pensarn situation, and they let us continue on our way. With some creative map reading and sensational timing, we managed to knock four hours off the journey! The lizards always enjoy train trips, but Tsam had a particularly good journey, flirting with a nice lady passenger. She got this great picture of Tsam showing off how big and male he is... (Pic credit K1m)