Final full day in Wales…Packed and ready for Southampton…

Out to lunch at the Cripple Creek Inn with Linda and Ken after visiting Raglan Castle.

From this siteFascinating Fact of the Day about Chepstow:
New housing development in the twentieth century took place to the north and south of the town centre, and more recently beyond the A466 road to the west of the town. The town developed rapidly after the opening of the Severn Bridge in 1966, which replaced the car ferry between Beachley and Aust and allowed easier commuting between Chepstow and larger centres including Bristol and Cardiff. Over £2 million was invested in regenerating the town centre in 2004–05. This scheme, which includes sculptures and other public art, encountered some local criticism over its high cost but gained several national awards reflecting its high design quality. The area beside the river has also been landscaped in association with a flood defense scheme.

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We’re wrapping up the 11 days we spent in Wales. Our bags are packed in a manner that will make it easy to unpack for the cruise. The final bag to close is the third supplies and toiletries bag and the backpack with our laptops.


Overnight last night I backed up my computer on our portable hard drive which surprises me it still works after purchasing it seven years ago. I’ve already backed up everything to one of two clouds and thus, regardless of digital crashes, we’re covered.


In the past 24 hours, I did a lot of consolidating removing packaging of various new unopened items to already opened items, making more space in the bag.  We do this regularly but I hadn’t done it since we arrived in the UK two months ago.
Linda and Ken each had the duck breast.
As of the end of today, we’ll have eaten most of the food we had on hand since we have no intention of taking food with us onto the cruise, especially based on the fact we’ll be flying to Minnesota (from Fort Lauderdale) in a mere 2½ weeks.  That’s hard to believe how quickly the time has passed.


After I finish today’s post and we’ve had our final late afternoon meal, I’ll begin working on the final expenses for these past two months, entering totals in tomorrow’s post and also on our spreadsheet.


A few days ago we each ordered the latest and greatest Google phones which will serve us well in years to come.  We’ll no longer have to buy SIM cards.  This phone is capable of affordable short term calling and data in 200 countries. 


Once the phones arrive we’ll sign up for Google Fi which has a pay-as-you-go plan that works for us.  They aren’t long term contracts with flat monthly fees but rather plans where we purchase calling and data as needed.  It automatically “kicks-in” when necessary.
Tom’s Italian chicken pasta lunch with garlic bread, of course.

With frequent use of our laptops using WiFi provided in holiday homes, we don’t have much need for data on phones other than for navigation while driving.  With Google Fi, we’ll only use the phone feature for short calls from wherever we may be in the world since there are fees based on the country we are in. 


We’ll continue to use Skype and Messenger for free calls.  We plan to cancel our current phone number plan with Skype which enabled us to make calls to any landlines or cell phones anywhere in the world.  But, there too there are monthly fees and costs for any calls that aren’t Skype to Skype.

The plan is such that Tom and I will need to use What’s App or Messenger to call each other. Otherwise, we’d have to each pay $.20 a minute based on our combined plan, which can add up quickly.  Texts are free so we may text one another while we’re apart anywhere in the world.
My delicious lunch with three grilled scallops and a few slices of gluten-free sausage.

With my current phone almost completely dead, I’m looking forward to being able to add apps.  My current phone even with an added data card doesn’t allow for the addition of many apps.  With the new 128 gig phone, I am looking forward to downloading every app I choose. 


We’re signing off for today to get back to packing some odds and ends and soon get to work on tomorrow’s post.  We’re leaving at 10:00 am and will upload the post before we depart.  We’ll see you tomorrow with the “numbers” and some favorite photos.


Happy Monday!

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Photo from one year ago today, October 21, 2018:
This male stole the warthog kill from the females, eventually leaving the remains for the hungry females. For more photos, please click here.

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