Advent in Wales

Mwnt

This is the area called Mwnt, pronounced Munt.  The stone structure you see in the middle of this picture is a kiln for limestone.  This area is known for the limestone that has been taken from it.

This is the church in Mwnt, the Holy Cross Church, where we plan to attend Christmas Eve Service.  It is a 13th century church and is still kept up by its members and not the wales Heritage.

Holy Cross Church

Y Mwnt (the Mount), the oldest church in the County of Ceredigion.  By tradition, a church has stood on this spot probably from the Age of the Saints in the fifth to seventh century.  The dedication to the 'Holy Cross' is a sign of antiquity, for it  seems that a lofty stone cross once stood at the summit of Y Foel hill which towers behind the church, rising abruptly from the sea to a height of around 250ft.  Foel y Mwnt means the exposed mount.

Pilgrims were drawn to this cross-preaching stone and landed on the sandy shores beneath.  Mwnt was a stopping place where vigil was kept over the bodies of the Saints who were taken to Bardsey Island, the traditional burial ground.  Mwnt was also a strategic point on the pilgrim route to the shrines of Cardigan and St Davids.

The age of the present building is uncertain, probably dates from the thirteenth or fourteenth century- the font, made from the Preselau stone, dates from around this time.  In its history, the church must have looked very different from its present plain simplicity.  The remains of a spandrel (arch) and carved stone indicate that the East Window (above the altar) was at one time a stone window of three lights.

A small window on the North Side (facing the sea) has been walled.  The window probably gave view to the altar to those, such as lepers, who were unable to come into church to share in the Mass- Communion.

The Flemings, natives of Flanders, landed in Mwnt in 1155.  Their defeat by the Welsh was commemorated at least in the eighteenth century by a games meeting held on the first Sunday in January called ‘Sul Coch y Mwnt’- Bloody (or Red) Sunday.  Within living memory many human skeletons and bones have been exposed from the farmlands of Flynnon Grog (the Well of the Cross) to the fringes of the shore.  A nearby stream still bears the name of Nant-y-Fflymmon, the Flemings’ Brook.

At the time of the Methodist revival in the late eighteenth century, clergymen who had strong Methodist convictions were invited to preach at Mwnt Church.

We praise Thee, O God, we acknowledge Thee to be the Lord.

We will be attending the Christmas Eve Service here!

 These beams bear carvings exhibiting the heads and shoulders of some of the figures of saints which adorned the screen Traces of coloring in red and green are discernible and it has been strongly suggested that there were twelve heads/figures representing the twelve disciples.  One wonders what has become of the other sections of the twelve disciples.  One wonders what has become of the sections of the richly carved beams.

Puppy Cuteness

Beach near our friends Di and John

More Puppies

St Dogmaels(Welsh:Llandudoch) 
The English and Welsh names seem to bear no similarity, but it has been suggested that possibly both names refer to the same saint or founder, with ‘mael’ (prince) and ‘tud’ (land or people of) being added to Dog/doch as in Dog mael and Tud doch.
The village has an abbey in it which we will visit when our family gets here!

More puppy cuteness!!

Look at that face!!

Brother and Sisterly Love!

This is Mount Zion Baptist Church, Cardigan, Wales

They have welcomed us into their church, homes and lives with open arms.

We have enjoyed our Advent Season here remembering the waiting period for our Lord to come to earth.  However, we have truly missed our family at home.  We have joined in Carol services, singing in Welsh (phonetically, of course), but it is not the same away from home.
We wish all a Merry Christmas and Blessed New Year!

Dover

Our last glimpses of France as we ferry across the channel.  It was a very windy day and the waves were quite large.  It was difficult to walk around the ferry as we swayed up and down with the water.

Dover

We were welcomed to Dover by these beautiful white cliffs that I have heard about for so long.  How wonderful for the weather to turn in time to greet us to the United Kingdom!

The town was also quite lovely.  It was nice to walk around on this crisp clear day.

The Dover Castle

A real barber!  Not the typical salon we have these days, but a real barber.
Roger just had to get his hair cut here!

Dover Marina Hotel

We had the pleasure to stay the evening here.  It was such a nice place to stay the night.  The hotel was built in 1832 and has withstood two world war bombings.  It has also had distinguished guests, such as Winston Churchill stay here.

A Memorial to Dunkirk

It was a fateful decision that would ultimately transform a military defeat into a moral victory. As German forces continued their advance into France, General Viscount Gort, Commander of the British Expeditionary Force in France, could see that the German invaders were getting the upper hand. The French Army was in disarray while his own forces were fighting desperately. The French called upon Gort to move his troops south to join them in a defensive stand. The British commander realized the action was futile and could lead to the annihilation of his command. If any of his forces were to be saved for the future defense of Britain, they would have to evacuate France immediately. On the evening of May 23, 1940, Gort ordered his commanders to retreat to the near-by port of Dunkirk - an action that would save the British Army to fight another day.

At the time, however, the success of the mission seemed highly unlikely. The British Army, joined by some French and Belgian forces would have to fight their way to the small port of Dunkirk, defend the town from German attack and hope that they could hold on long enough for ships from England to come to pull them off the beach.

Another fateful decision, this time on the part of the Germans, now helped their rescue. On May 24, Hitler, for reasons that are still unclear, ordered his tanks to halt their pursuit of the retreating Allied forces. In England the call went out for ships - any ships - to help with the rescue. On May 26 an unbelievable armada set sail. Motorboats, sloops, fishing boats, yachts, ferries, barges and every other variety of boat imaginable poured out of the Thames River and the ports that lined the English Channel to make their way across the Channel to rescue the beleaguered troops.

Guided by the smoke and flame filling the sky above Dunkirk, the ragtag rescue fleet made its way through continuous German attack and treacherous waters to the stranded troops. The rescuers found the beaches clogged with men. Some clamored along piers to reach the rescue ships, others wadded out from shore to waters nearly over their heads for rescue. All the time the beach was under attack from German artillery, bombers and fighter planes.

The operation, code-named Dynamo, continued until June 4. At its beginning, the British thought they would be lucky to rescue 50,000. In the end, approximately 340,000 British, French and Belgians were snatched from the shore. 40,000 were left behind and killed or captured.

"It was the queerest, most nondescript flotilla that ever was, and it was manned by every kind of Englishman, never more than two men, often only one, to each small boat. There were bankers and dentists, taxi drivers and yachtsmen, longshoremen, boys, engineers, fishermen and civil servants. . .

It was dark before we were well clear of the English coast. It wasn't rough, but there was a little chop on, sufficient to make it very wet, and we soaked the Admiral to the skin. Soon, in the dark, the big boats began to overtake us. We were in a sort of dark traffic lane, full of strange ghosts and weird, unaccountable waves from the wash of the larger vessels. When destroyers went by, full tilt, the wash was a serious matter to us little fellows. We could only spin the wheel to try to head into the waves, hang on, and hope for the best. . .

Even before it was fully dark we had picked up the glow of the Dunkirk flames, and now as we drew nearer the sailing got better, for we could steer by them and see silhouetted the shapes of other ships, of boats coming home already loaded, and of low dark shadows that might be enemy motor torpedo boats.

Then aircraft started dropping parachute flares. We saw them hanging all about us in the night, like young moons. The sound of the firing and the bombing was with us always, growing steadily louder as we got nearer and nearer. The flames grew, too. From a glow they rose up to enormous plumes of fire that roared high into the everlasting pall of smoke. As we approached Dunkirk there was an air attack on the destroyers and for a little the night was brilliant with bursting bombs and the fountain sprays of tracer bullets.

The beach, black with men, illumined by the fires, seemed a perfect target, but no doubt the thick clouds of smoke were a useful screen.

The picture will always remain sharp-etched in my memory - the lines of men wearily and sleepily staggering across the beach from the dunes to the shallows, falling into little boats, great columns of men thrust out into the water among bomb and shell splashes. The foremost ranks were shoulder deep, moving forward under the command of young subalterns, themselves with their heads just above the little waves that rode in to the sand. As the front ranks were dragged aboard the boats, the rear ranks moved up, from ankle deep to knee deep, from knee deep to waist deep, until they, too, came to shoulder depth and their turn.

The little boats that ferried from the beach to the big ships in deep water listed drunkenly with the weight of men. The big ships slowly took on lists of their own with the enormous numbers crowded aboard. And always down the dunes and across the beach came new hordes of men, new columns, new lines.

On the beach was a destroyer, bombed and burned. At the water's edge were ambulances, abandoned when their last load had been discharged.

There was always the red background, the red of Dunkirk burning. There was no water to check the fires and there were no men to be spared to fight them. Red, too, were the shell bursts, the flash of guns, the fountains of tracer bullets.

The din was infernal. The 5.9 batteries shelled ceaselessly and brilliantly. To the whistle of shells overhead was added the scream of falling bombs. Even the sky was full of noise - anti-aircraft shells, machine-gun fire, the snarl of falling planes, the angry hornet noise of dive bombers. One could not speak normally at any time against the roar of it and the noise of our own engines. We all developed 'Dunkirk throat,' a sore hoarseness that was the hallmark of those who had been there.

We stayed there until everybody else had been sent back, and then went pottering about looking for stragglers. While we were doing that, a salvo of shells got one of our troopships alongside the mole [pier]. She was hit clean in the boilers and exploded in one terrific crash. There were then, I suppose, about 1000 Frenchmen on the mole. We had seen them crowding along its narrow crest, outlined against the flames. They had gone out under shellfire to board the boat, and now they had to go back again, still being shelled. It was quite the most tragic thing I ever have seen in my life. We could do nothing with our little park dinghy. . .Yet through all the noise I will always remember the voices of the young subalterns as they sent their men aboard, and I will remember, too, the astonishing discipline of the men. They had fought through three weeks of retreat, always falling back without orders, often without support. Transport had failed. They had gone sleepless. They had been without food and water. Yet they kept ranks as they came down the beaches, and they obeyed commands. . .

Going home, the Jerry dive bombers came over us five times, but somehow left us alone though three times they took up an attacking position. A little down the coast, towards Gravelines, we picked up a boatload of Frenchmen rowing off. We took them aboard. They were very much bothered as to where our 'ship' was, said quite flatly that it was impossible to go to England in a thing like ours. Too, too horribly dangerous."

                                                                                                              From Eyewitnesstohistory.com

Learning the story of Dunkirk has been such an uplifting experience for me, to know of the selflessness and true sacrifice that people have given for the sake of people they do not even know.

Now, on to Wales!

Puppy Paradise!!

Wales

We are now in Cwmcou (pronounced coom-coi), New Castle Emlyn, Wales.  What a beautiful place.  Our first day in Wales was an adventure.  We took three separate trains from Dover to Camarthen.  We did not do much scouting out as to what we were to do on our change overs, mistakenly thinking it was going to be a simple change from one train to another.  Well, we were oh so wrong.  When we got to London, we discovered we were going to not only change trains, but needed to take the Tube to another station  By the time we got to the appropriate station and found the trains, we were two minutes late, and therefore, missed our train.  We had to wait about an hour for the next train.  After that, the train was late and we missed the next train we were to take by 15 minutes.  We caught the next train after hanging out at the station in the cold.  This train was so full, because another train did not come and it was toting two train's worth of passengers.  It was literally standing room only.  We were standing in the aisle as we trekked through county after county of the United Kingdom.  We finally arrived at the station we were to be picked up about an hour late.  It was pitch black and we could not see the beauty of this place.

We were welcomed to our "new home" by the lovely Marie and Malcolm.  We will be here for another 6 weeks taking care of their puppies.  They have four wonderful "babies" who have been such a joy to play with.  I have truly missed having dogs around.  Such personalities.  Such fun!

I cannot seem to get all four into one picture.  They are a bundle of energy.  It is so fun to walk with them around the lanes and play with them in the paddock.  They each have their own, special personality.  We have the Grand Dame, the teen-age wiley one, the Gentle Giant, and the Mischievious ut loving Lug!!  What absolute joy they are!

We get to enjoy glorious sunrises and sunsets every morning.  Each morning, God paints 

another glorious picture in the sky and kisses us goodnight with loving colors.  The air is also 

so full of oxygen, I can feel the difference in my lungs.

 We are also about 10 minutes away from the coast.  This is not the nearest coastal town to us, but Newport. We went to visit here after we scouted out where my sister and her family will be staying over Christmas.  Yes, believe it or not, I go to Wales and I get to be with family!  Life is good!

 This is a site from the town near us, Newcastle Emlyn.  How joyous am I to have found 

this serene area!  I wish pictures could truly share the beauty that surrounds us here!

 Today, Roger and I went to a church in the town of Cardigan.  What an uplifting experience.  Roger and I both felt immediately at home and welcomed.  We spoke to so many people who made us feel as if we had known them for a long time.
The pastor spoke of Baptism, and giving your whole self over to Christ.  He talked about having the resolve to every day renew our dedication to our Lord.  He also talked about how we do not wait until we are "good enough" before we get baptized.  He spoke of how God wants us to come to Him how we are and we are then cleaned and made complete by Him.  How wonderful to be able to come before the Lord as we are with no pretense, and He loves us just that way.
I am hopeful that I share His love with each of you in all my interactions I have with you.  Because I am loved, I am able to love.  And I do, I love each of you.
Many blessings to all of you this Advent Season as we wait upon Our Lord!!