Posts
"Hardd, hafan, hedd". That's the town motto of Llandudno and it is believed to come from a description of Wales as a 'beautiful haven of peace'. It's not exactly how you'd describe the bustling promenade, the busy pier, or the multiple karaoke bars that flank hectic Mostyn Street in the evenings but when you're up on the Great Orme, with the gentle sound of trams and cable cars passing by, and only Kashmir goats, seals, and a few thousand other holidaymakers for company it does ring a little true.
For the 7th TADS two-dayer, the 50th ever blogged TADS walk, and the 3rd one to be based in Wales (after 20202's trip to Chepstow and 2021's to Llangollen this was the first walk that would take place entirely in the prinicipality), a group of ten of us would be heading up to Llandudno and I was anxious that the weather should be good and the walk should be interesting. Luckily both these things came to pass.
It started earlier than normal. I met Pam and Mo at Clapham Junction (platform 9, of course) and we took the train to Basingstoke. Pam and I met with Neil W and Tina. After a quick cup of tea we walked into Basingstoke town centre and met with Shep, Mo (who'd checked in to the Premier Inn), and Jack (who, sadly, wouldn't be joining us in Wales) at the Duck & Tipple.
From there it was on to the Agra Balti House and a last drink in the Bounty. I stayed at Shep's and in the morning me, him, and Laura picked up Mo at her hotel and joined Neil, Tina, and Pam in a convoy of Skodas (well, two) and headed off.
Our bladders, or some of our bladders, weren't, at this point, as crap as we'd feared so after a brief stop in Newbury we made it all the way to Norton Canes service station in Staffordshire on the M6 toll road where I had my first ever Leon (a vegan LOVe burger - really rather good) and my first ever Coke Zero (not bad either).
From there it was north and then west with a diversion through Nantwich to avoid congestion on the motorway. We finally arrived in rainy Llandudno seven hours later, checked into the Tyndale and various other hotels and reconvened in the rather pleasant Cottage Loaf pub, meeting with Neil and Bee, before heading to Dino's for a meal of burgers, chips, pizzas.
Food-wise, it wasn't a particularly healthy eating weekend. After Dino's a few of us headed to The Town House pub where, of course, karaoke was taking place. Most of it was abysmal but the older lady who got up to sing Patsy Cline's Crazy was pretty damned good. We'd be meeting her again later in the weekend.
I slept pretty well in the Tyndale and met Pam and Mo for breakfast. My Welsh rarebit (with tomatoes) was a little bit too salty (and even too cheesy) for my liking but it set me up for the day and after a senior moment when I tried to buy a copy of The Guardian and a bottle of water in the local WHSmiths without money or a card, I met the others by the pretty white Ferris wheel on the pier and we started the walk. All of us except Bee (who's suffering with a dodgy knee - the bee's knees used to mean something good but we may need to rethink that) and Catherine who was running late.
Bee would wait for Catherine and catch us up later. Llandudno's pier is the longest in Wales (no match for Southend in terms of length but more fun) and was designed by James Brunless and constructed by Walter MacFarlane of Glasgow. It opened in 1877 and was Grade II listed in 1969. In 2005 it was awarded the hotly contested Pier of the Year gong.
We passed the Grand Hotel which started as a bathhouse but soon became the largest hotel in Wales. It was briefly owned by Butlin's who used it to provide unspecified 'adult entertainment' to the people of Llandudno (population 20,000) and the many people who chose, and still choose, to holiday there.
The town, which here looks out to the Irish Sea, is named for its patron saint, Saint Tudno who is said to be one of the seven sons of King Seithenyn. Seithenyn's legendary kingdom, Cantref y Gwaelod, legend has it, fell into the sea when the errant sovereign drunkenly neglected it!
A zig-zag path took us to a green and tranquil oasis of gorsedd stones, a cable car station, and some pretty trees. The green of the grass and the blue of the sky looked beautiful and the cable cars, painted in a variety of pastel shades, and the views down to the pier and promenade - as well as the mountains farther afield, made for an altogether rather pleasing aspect.
From the North Shore Toll Gate we joined Marine Drive. With imposing limestone rocks to our left and the blue of the Irish Sea to our left we followed this for some time. We were spotting birds quite easily but even more excitement came with the sighting of a handful of seals including one family group. If you zoom in one of the photos below you can just make out a very cute seal face.
A passing local explained to us that the numerous wind farms we could see out in the Irish Sea were the reason the seals had returned in such numbers. They prevent fishing boats from taking the seal's food and the concrete bases they have seem to attract seals too. Yet another good reason for wind farms.
The excitement of seeing the seals was soon replaced by the excitement of our first encounter with the famous Kashmir goats of Llandudno. You may remember them in lockdown 2020 running around the streets and gardens of Llandudno itself. They are believed to descend from goats that were gifted to Queen Victoria from the Shah of Persia. Some of them have very impressive horns.
The Great Orme itself is what, for me, gives Llandudno its unique charm. I'd visited often as a child and, again, three years ago with Michelle and always had a nice time. The Great Orme is a limestone headland whose English name comes from the Old Norse word for a sea serpent. In Welsh it is referred to as Cyngreawdr Fynydd (named by the 12c poet Gwalchmal ap Meilyr).
There are several working wells here, interesting flora, and the fauna includes several endangered butterflies and moths (silver-studded blue, grayling, and silky wave), spiders, rare horseshoe bats, guillemots, kittiwakes, razorbills, gulls, fulmars, ravens, owls, and peregrine falcons. As well, of course, as those ol' goats.
Human activity began on the Orme four thousand years ago with the Bronze Age copper mines. It is said that the first English Prince of Wales was baptised on the Orme and his palace burnt down by Owain Glyndwr in 1400. The GO tramway was built in 1902 and a cable car in 1969. On clear days you can see as far as the Isle of Man, the Lake District, and the Winter Hill transmitting station near Chorley in Lancashire.
We ascended steeply up a narrow fern flanked path to, first, the halfway station and then on to the Summit Station. The highest point of the Orme where people posed for photos and both the tram and the cable car passengers emptied out. Bee and Catherine were waiting for us and we took soft drinks and snacks (including Welsh cakes) at a little mobile outlet perched in a pretty spot atop the headland.
That was a lovely relaxing moment but, of course, our next task was to descend and my first attempt to lead us down took us on a path that got ever narrower and looked to be getting potentially risky. When Neil B suggested we go another way everyone was in complete agreement and soon we were all back on the road pretty much following the route of the tram down.
It was, in places, still pretty steep. But I love the trams of Llandudno. I love the way they're painted up and I love the way they travel so quietly. To me they're the equal of the ones in San Francisco. The Kings Head pub near the lower tram station looked a lovely spot for a pint in the sun (and even promised a Motown evening on Sunday) but it was too soon for us so I just chuckled at the weak pun in FISH TRAM CHIPS and we carried on past some large, architecturally pleasing, houses on Church Walks to the West Shore Boating Lake.
Or, as overheard from one agitated mother to her child who fancied a dip with the ducks, a "flaming duckpond". Another one of Llandudno's great charms is that it is has two beaches. The North Shore is the busy one - with the pier and the amusement arcades - and the West Shore is much quieter. Though I must assume the water was warmer as there were more people paddling and even swimming in it.
A few of us stopped for an ice cream (a great selection but I still just had a 99) and we carried on to the Art Deco looking West Shore Beach Cafe where I had a chip butty. A few others ate, a few didn't. Shep had a Snowdon beer and Neil W became so obsessed with a local house he looked it up on Rightmove and almost arranged an immediate viewing.
It was a nice stop and it was just as well as the next stretch into Deganwy would be tough on the legs. Walking on the soft sand was more difficult than on the hard wetter sand so we swapped around but still had to pass a rocky stretch. Luckily, the views on this stretch as the river Conway flows into the sea were breathtaking.
Soon enough, and via a level crossing that closed as some of the group had yet to pass, we reached Deganwy where we'd meet with Laura, who'd been handing out Buddhist flyers, in the Castle View pub. A pub that lived up to its name by looking across to the impressive Conwy Castle. If you asked a child to draw a castle it's quite likely they'd come up with something like Conwy's.
The Castle View pit stop became, somewhat inevitably, a two pint mistake and this, equally inevitably, meant that it wasn't looking before some walkers (no names, no pack drill) had to pay a visit to the gents in Lidl. One of them even had to go again about ten minutes later!
Mo gave a tutorial on how to do squats and I tried to work out which of Conwy's many bridges we needed to cross - which proved pretty easy. Deganwy is small (population around 4,000) and it's a place where one in three people speak Welsh. It's overlooked by the ruins of Deganwy Castle (fortified in the 6c as the stronghold of Maelgwyn Gwynedd, King of Gwynedd).
The castle is, of course, hugely overshadowed by Conwy's. We crossed the muddy banks of the Conwy river to reach it. That river has flowed thirty-four miles from Llyn Conwy (via Betws-y-coed and Swallow Falls) to reach here and what a destination it is. Conwy is a very pretty little town whose extensive town walls, and castle, suggest it was once a big hitter too.
There's loads to see but, sadly, we wouldn't have time to see it. As well as the castle (built in the Middle Ages by Edward I of England, began life as a Cistercian monastery, was hidden in by Richard II in 1399, and taken over by Owain Glyndwr in 1401) and the town walls there are those aforesaid bridges (the Conwy Suspension Bridge built 1822-26 by Thomas Telford of Pontcysyllte Aqueduct fame, the Conwy Railway Bridge, built by Robert Stephenson of Rocket fame), Aberconwy House - a 15c medieval merchant's house, Plas Mawr - a 16c Elizabethan town house, and the smallest house in Great Britain
I wasn't missing that. We all stood by the door and realised none of us would be able to get in without ducking but as Neil B was the tallest amongst us he had to pose for photos. Apparently one of the former occupants was roughly the same height as Neil too.
We continued up the High Street and arrived in the Saffron Indian restaurant pretty much exactly at the booked time of 7.30pm. It was a decent enough curry house (I had tarka daal, bombay potatoes, plain naan, poppadoms, and a couple of Cobras) made quirky by the fact that the waiting staff insisted on writing every order on old triplicate carbon paper pads.
Laura drove Shep and Catherine back to the hotel and the rest of us got the bus back to Llandudno from the charmingly titled Town Ditch. Back in Llandudno, some of us went for a couple more drinks. There was a rock band playing in the Town House who played, of course, Mr Brightside (in Llandudno, you are never more than five minutes from a rendition of Mr Brightside) as well as tracks by Rage Against The Machine, AC/DC, and The Stereophonics.
They weren't great but they weren't terrible and we were on holiday. Not long after the band had finished I noticed it had turned midnight. Bee noticed too - and soon wished me a happy birthday. Neil W bought me a birthday pint and got chatting to the Patsy Cline lady at the bar who he brought over to join us.
On being told it was my birthday the 73 year old Glaswegian Kathryn mimed pulling her knickers down and asked me if I wanted to "grab a granny". The subject was quickly changed and her Mancunian friend came over to join us too. They had more energy than most of us but then they'd been on the cable car and we'd walked the Orme.
Unsurprisingly I slept well and soon woke to my first birthday present of my 54th year. We'd been chatting about how Fruit Pastilles are vegan now and I mentioned I'd not had any since turning veggie in 1984. Mo kindly presented me with a pack and later in the day I thoroughly enjoyed them. As I remembered, the blackcurrant ones were best.
Pam's card left my morning tea cup full of glitter and I stuck to a light breakfast of cereal and toast and jam after yesterday's rarebit. Soon it was time for us all to meet again and get the 12 Sapphire bus to Abergele (final destination Rhyl). Despite my best attempts, we ended up at various different bus stops and Catherine and Bee took a different bus to Abergele but we all met there.
In the Tesco carpark. En route we passed a convoy of Minis but then a dark note fell on the weekend when I received a call from an old friend I'd not spoken to for many years. His brother, another old friend who, tragically, had been very ill for quite a long time, had died. Just 49 years old. Such a horrible waste and if it seems cruel and unfair that it should happen on my birthday and while I'm on holiday that's not actually the case.
It would be sad news any day but at least I was with my friends and I was able to walk in the fresh air. My phone had been pinging enough with birthday wishes and walking group messages and now it would, sporadically throughout the day, ping with people discovering the news. I'd not seen either of the brothers for some time but they were once among my closest friends.
Some of the others knew them a little bit but none as well as I did. The show, quite simply, had to go on. So we walked down Sea Road which lead us to, you'll not have seen this coming, the sea! As well as views up in to the green green hills of Gwrych Castle (where they filmed the 20th series of I'm A Celebrity in 2020 - winner:Giovanna Fletcher - as well as 1973's Holiday On The Buses. Local folklore has it the castle is haunted by a headless monster. More factually, it was built between 1810 and 1825 between the fabulously monikered Lloyd Hesketh Bamford-Hesketh
Abergele (named for the river Gele, a tributary of the Clwyd) was once on the site of an important Celtic monastery but, truth be told, we didn't see much of it as we were soon heading west along a wide windswept seafront on a noticeably more overcast, yet still dry, day than the previous one.
Tina and Pam did some top notch bird and butterfly spotting over the weekend but, seals and goats, aside my favourites were these cormorants who all took a post each. The one in the distance seems to have got a raw deal as their post is almost entirely submerged,
We somehow managed to miss Tides Cafe which I'd pencilled in as a potential snack stop but at the rather unimpressive mouth of the Afon Dulas we saw some doggies having the absolute best time of their life by splashing around in the water. Oh to be a dog. Life looks much simpler.
Round these parts you can see many joggers, cyclists, and walls of sea defences as well as getting a better view out to those windfarms. It's on the edge of Llandullas and there's a marker to inform you you have reached the site of Richard II's betrayal in 1399.
If I'm truly honest with myself, the walk wasn't as impressive as the previous day's one. It was flatter though. But it was longer. At Bryn Williams Porth Eirias there's a little restaurant and bar (with the bird statue full of plastic bottles outside making an obvious but important point about environmental issues) but some of us agreed it was a bit steep (was it £16 for fish fingers or something?) and instead sat in the snack bar part for a little break. I had a chocolate brownie and an orangeade.
Old Colwyn and Colwyn Bay beaches were pretty busy with holidaymakers (apart from the bits that were shut off to the public and full of diggers!) and I must admit part of me just wanted to chill on the beach with the Sunday paper and a drink!
Instead it was time for us to pose on the COLWYN sign. I greedily bagged the Y (getting back down wasn't so easy) though Pam and Mo look more comfy in the C and the O.
On the bus down I'd spotted the Cayley Flyer and thought it looked a good bet for a stop on the way back. It was, surprisingly, almost entirely empty - and it served no ale. So not to everyone's taste but we all appreciated a sit down and a drink.
The jukebox played a boring Phil Collins ballad, Marie Marie by Shakin' Stevens (!), and some kind of shoegaze track called Coma by Fuss which a few of the walkers were taken with. From the window of the pub some watched the Red Arrows performing at the nearby Rhyl air show and at one point I asked where Shep was despite the fact he was sat directly opposite to me. Is this what happens when you reach 54?
From the Cayley Flyer, Bee and Catherine jumped on the bus as they were meeting a friend in Llandudno and the rest of us set off on the long final stretch. The fact that people started to spread out and that they talked less told me that people were getting tired.
After a long and uneventful inland stretch and then a fairly steep climb to the edge of the Little Orme the sight of the LLANDUDNO WELCOMES YOU CROESO sign was something of a tonic. From there the wide panoramic sweep of the bay of Llandudno came into view and we gradually descended towards it, past a field of cows, and into either the town centre or back to the hotels to freshen up.
Me and Neil B went straight to The Cottage Loaf where we met with Bee and her friend Rebecca as well as Rebecca's boyfriend Michael. Slowly, everyone else joined us. Many had eaten at Barnacle's fish and chip shop (apparently a very good range of vegan goods), others elsewhere. I wasn't hungry (for reasons I'd discover the next day) so I just enjoyed the Motown music playing in the Loaf and the company of my friends as we chatted about songs about birds and the likelihood of the Llandudno parrot rescue centre being open at 9pm on a Sunday night.
I slept ok that night and had another small breakfast before Shep and Laura picked Mo and myself up and headed back - stopping again at Norton Canes where we met with Neil W, Tina, and Pam and I had a veggie hot dog and another Coke Zero - to Basingstoke. My sore throat had developed into a cough and a sneeze and I heard Mo cough a couple of times as we boarded the train back to London.
We split at Clapham Junction and I took the Overground to Peckham Rye and walked home. By the time I'd unloaded my rucksack, Mo had WhatsApped to say she'd had a positive Covid test so I did a test. Mine was positive too. I felt, and still feel, a bit groggy but I'm not too bad and hope to be on the mend in time for Saturday's next TADS walk, Lissing With Confidence - Liphook to Petersfield, but we shall see.
Despite the Covid and despite the very sad news on Sunday morning I still managed to have a lovely weekend and for that, and for the photos (and, in Shep's case, all the driving), I thank Pam, Mo, Neil W, Tina, Shep, Laura, Neil B, Bee, Catherine, Rebecca, Michael, and Jack. I also thank Llandudno and its surroundings. Hardd, hafan, hedd indeed.
