Saturday morning dawned clear and bright so we went to Caerwent (an ancient Roman city). Here there is a amphitheatre and the old barracks which have the groundwork all restored. We took a guided walk around the town and ended up at a pub (no surprise there then!) beside the River Usk (that's me and Sydney posing for a photo beside the River Usk above). In the afternoon we went to Usk and had a walk around the town and then walked around Usk Castle (see pictures above). Usk Castle is really quite impressive and living inside the grounds were a couple of Geese and a couple of fancy Chickens!.
On Sunday it started off with April showers but I was much better behaved in the rain than I used to be (I must be getting used to this English Climate!). We went into Pontypool and were horrified as to just how dead the town was. It must be close to the leaders of having the most shut and/or boarded up shops. They have a large Tesco near to the town and I guess that just killed off the town centre completely. In Pontypool they have a famous park (called, not surprisingly, Pontypool Park!). It was the grounds of an old Manor house in the 1700's but in the 1990's the local council took it on as part of the Valleys Initiative. It is very large (too large for us to walk around) but very impressive. Within the park are Pontypool RFC and the Leisure Centre. We had our lunch in the park and then went for a short stroll along the Brecon & Monmouthshire Canal before heading home to help Stacey move Oscar & Sydney up to her bedroom to make room for Jasper.
While we were away, Oscar was rehomed to Michelle and Shona's. Please see what my Dad has written under Coco's section to explain what happened and why. We are all missing Coco's shouting but we do still have Billie who, if anything, can shout even louder!!!. When we got home from our week-end away Dad helped Stacey take Magic and Oscar's cage apart so they could move it up to Stacey's bedroom and reassemble it up there. Dad get very nervous when Magic & Oscar are out in the Bird Room with the bigger birds as us bigger birds could do a lot of damage and Oscar likes taking us all on!!! So they are now in Stacey's room where they can be out of their cage for loads of time and be quite safe behind their beaded door screen to Stacey's room. I have been up in the Study this morning with Sydney & Phoebe and Magic has been quite a little chatterbox! He was a bit overpowered by us bigger birds downstairs and no-one really new how much he could talk. They seem to be happy there and there is now a space for another cage in the birdroom! I wonder how long that will stay there!!! Well, actually, I know the answer to that. Our parrents have already agreed to rehome Jasper. Jasper is a Ducoprps Cockatoo - a much smaller species of Cockatoo and she is coming on May 3rd after the Easter Holidays.
Sydney and me are looking forward to the Easter Hols as we are going as usual. We are off to Truro for 10 days, then back to Crediton for the Easter w/e and then back home for 3 days before going back to Crediton for the Mayday Bank Holiday w/e. We are sooooooo looking forward to this holiday!!! Well that's all for now! I doubt I'll have much more to report until after our holiday. ttfn.