Well hello there, Beastie friends! It’s lucky you’re here… After the emotional highs and lows of last week’s post, Paddy and Plunkett are squeezing in one more adventure in Wales before heading for home. And where are they today, I wonder?
Looks nice and peaceful, doesn’t it? But just as Plunkett is unwrapping his sandwiches in preparation for a nice quiet lunch in the countryside…
WHOOOOOOOOSH! What’s that?
Looks like the boys might have stumbled upon the home of Velocity 2 – the fastest zipline in the world!
So Paddy drags Plunkett off to the Zip World visitor centre to find out more…
Plunkett is happy to pose with the sign, even though he is secretly dreaming of getting back to his picnic. But Paddy is hungry for adventure… And his curiosity leads him deeper into the building.
Luckily, the Wall of Stats will tell him everything he wants to know about this high-speed glide over a former slate quarry!
“Top speed 118 miles an hour? Woweeeeee!”
As you probably guessed, Paddy can’t get up there quickly enough. Leaving Plunkett trailing in his wake, he runs back to the summit as quickly as his little short legs will carry him.
“Velocity 2, here I come!”
There he is now, ready to go.
Later, Paddy rejoins Plunkett at the bottom of the quarry. Plunkett has had a lovely afternoon of munching cheese and pickle sandwiches and watching the humans hurtling down the zipline. And he’s very interested to get a Paddy’s-eye view!
“How was it, then? I didn’t see you come down, but they go so quickly…”
Paddy mumbles something.
“Hmmm? What’s that?”
“They wouldn’t let me go on it.”
Oh no! Poor Paddy! It turns out that there’s a 4ft minimum height limit. But, as usual, Plunkett knows exactly how to make things better. A little bit of digital wizardry later, and…
“Now, smile while I take your picture here…”
Well, that’s all the proof I need. Well done, Paddy! Although I really don’t know how your next adventure will ever compete with this one…
The boys will be back in a few weeks – but there’s a new Beastie for you to meet next Tuesday, so be sure to join us then!
That’s right, it wouldn’t be a Paddy and Plunkett day out if they weren’t wreaking havoc on a train somewhere… And this time it’s the Welsh Highland Heritage Railway that’s getting the Beastie treatment. Luckily for them, the railway has a monster of its own to keep these two under control – the legendary Welsh Red Dragon!
Nope, definitely not.
Fortunately, Plunkett has got some sense into his woolly head – juuuuuust in time, by the looks of things!
I tried to ID Paddy and Plunkett’s train, but I didn’t get too far… Are there any locals out there who can help?
“This Gelert must have been a pretty important person!” says Paddy.
Hanging out with all those owlets certainly put a smile back on Paddy’s woolly face.
“Plunkett! PLUNKETT! Can you see the keys for these anywhere? I think I’d like to take one of them for a spin!”
But Paddy and Plunkett were in a bit of a pickle when we left them 
Fortunately, I was getting all alarmed over nothing… Turns out that this rather large octopus is a big fan of the boys, and couldn’t wait to snatch them up for a hug and a photo!
Anything else lurking in the shadows? The 
He’s wandered into the Seahorse Nursery, another of the Sea Zoo’s ongoing conservation projects.
Pollution of the world’s oceans with plastic is already having a serious impact on marine life… And unless we fix this plastic problem, all of the fantastic creatures Paddy and Plunkett met here could vanish from the seas forever! They don’t want to see this any more than I do, so they asked me to wrap up this post by sharing a few little things we can all do to bin the plastic… For good.
The Menai Strait is the narrow stretch of water that separates the island of Anglesey from the Welsh mainland. It looks calm enough here, doesn’t it? But strong and ever-changing tidal currents make it highly unpredictable and tricky to cross. In the past, this served the locals well – Anglesey was one of the last refuges of the Druids, at a time when they were being displaced all over Britain by the arrival of the Romans.
The Lobster Hatchery is one of several conservation projects based here in Anglesey Sea Zoo. Overfishing in the 1980s meant that local wild lobster populations took a huge hit, so the Hatchery is here to help them get back on their spiny little feet. The main focus of their work is a captive breeding programme, but research and education are also important aspects of what they do.
Well, moon jellies, if you’re going to be particular about it… But they do have an otherworldly look to them, don’t they? He could have watched them for hours – which is unusual for Paddy!
And although Paddy was momentarily distracted by the starfish that was taking a stroll across the front of the tank…
… It wasn’t long before he found a new way to pass the time – playing hide and seek with the fish!
But what’s that stirring in the hidden depths of the aquarium? Uh-oh!
By all accounts, Paddy was ready to storm off in a huff… Until Plunkett corrected himself. Parys Mountain is a mine – in fact, during its heyday in the 18th and 19th centuries, it was the largest copper mine in Europe.
“Look, Plunkett! Blue and orange rocks!”
“Hmmmm, what have we here? An old stone windmill, perhaps for pumping water out of the mineshafts? Fascinating! And look at that stonework!”
“Wow! That’s pretty incredible!”
It really is! And all the more so when you remember that this massive hole in the ground…
… But following a Grand Slam victory for Wales in the Six Nations rugby tournament earlier this year, she thought a special celebratory addition to their wardrobe was in order. So I found a willing Beastie model to help me get the sizing right, and TA-DAAAAAAH!
One Beastified Wales Rugby jersey!
… And added an appliquéd number 8 on the back!
The significance of the number 8 is still a mystery to us here at Beastie Towers, but it’s clearly got some sort of special meaning to Jon Beastie and his human counterpart. I’m keeping an eye on