Happy Halloween! It has been some time since my last blog entry, and what an amazing journey it has been so far in my fall travels through my home away from home Wales. After leaving my last WWOOF host I spent an entire week exploring the great outdoors in the Snowdonia National Park. My first stop was Bala, a small town located alongside what I think may be the largest lake in wales, also called Bala. There is an interesting local legend associated with the creation of the lake itself which involves divine retribution on an evil prince who once lived in a castle where the lake now stands. When the Princes domain was flooded the only one to escape was the harp player. It is truly beautiful how deeply embedded music is in the Celtic Consciousness. Not just fiddle music, but the music of the Welsh language itself. Music and sound have an innate ability to express the deep, timeless truths which cannot be easily explained away by words, and the Celts must have realized this. Bards were the links to the spirit world. They lived half in and half out of the physical world and they drew their knowledge from the "music of the spheres" or "the heavens". It felt great to be able to walk into a pub in Bala and exchange a few words in welsh with some local farmers. Then the next day hiking along the lake and surrounding country side was nice as well.
My next stop was the Conwy valley, a hiker's paradise. I stayed at a lovely back-packers barn in a small town just outside the walled castle town of Conwy itself. There was a blue-grass festival going on the first night I arrived and I got to hear some great music. Didn't pull out my fiddle this time since I don't play too much blue-grass, but it was sure nice to listen, and I made some new friends from South-Wales who have welcomed me to stay at their house any time. The next four days I hiked the local mountains and valleys and explored the legends that encompass the area. The height of the hiking for me was to hike up a great mountain named after a distant ancestor Llewellyn the last prince of Wales. There was even another mountain named after his wife Gwenllyn. Nothing like a little outdoors adventure to bring one closer to the natural world, and my next stop Felin Uchaf was another chance to renew my connection to the Welsh land and culture.
Felin Uchaf is situated on the south west of the Llyn Peninsula N.W. Wales. The Llyn is an area rich in heritage, and like Snowdonia, a strong-hold of the Welsh Language. I arrived at Felin Uchaf enthusiastic about the potential for such a place. A natural living center, rooted in the welsh culture, language and traditions seeking to involve volunteers and the community together to bring the past to life. I arrived on a beautiful day, and was greeted straight away by the volunteers and staff. There were two payed staff and six volunteers on the day I arrived. There is also Daffydd Davies-Hughes who runs the venture, and what a venture it was. I felt that I fit in right away. My home for the next three weeks would be a Celtic round hut. I would share meals every night with a diverse group of people. The next three weeks would be exciting, inspiring and educational. When I did find free time, the harp or fiddle were close at hand waiting for traditional Welsh tunes. One night I was asked to join Daffydd in a story telling night for twenty youngsters from a near-by school. My job was to play a tune during the story of the drowning of the lower one-hundreds, a traditional Welsh story recounting the loss of an entire kingdom during a flood. There were always stories at Felin Uchaf. One night a large group of professional story tellers came and we had a fire-side story filled afternoon that no television program can ever begin to compete with. Daffydd himself is a great man willing to spend most of his waking hours working with the volunteers and building and designing the dream of felin Uchaf. Sleeping under the moon and stars and immersing myself in the sacredness of the land renewed my interest in Celtic mysticism, and I came across some great books on the subject of Celtic astrology.
Come Halloween Day, it was time for me to depart and make my way to nearby Nant Gwrtheyrn. The Welsh Language and heritage center. This being my second time at Nant Gwrtheyrn, I am still blown away at the beauty of this little village. Nant Gwrtheyrn used to be the home of a mid-evil king of Arthurian legend called Vortigern. In more recent times it became a granite mining village until it was shut down in the mid-late twentieth century. I will be here for the next week on the foundation Welsh language course. Allot of people ask why I want to learn welsh. I always find that question hard to answer, because there are so many reasons why I want to learn any language, and especially one such as Welsh that has connections with my family. One very important reason is that I think language is rooted in spirituality and a critical component of any movement of cultural movement. It has everything to do with peace and understanding to me. Language includes sounds that work like music to open new doors and paths to all sorts of discoveries and understandings. So, being here is very important to me, and I am very grateful.
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