Day 65: Nant Gwrtheyrn and Portmeirion

Megan Jones was a wonderful hostess. Like every good mother she worried that I wasn’t eating enough ,even though I told her that doing so much driving all my nourishment was likely to sink below my waistline and I would be in danger of developing Lorry Driver’s bum! Her son was the sheep farmer. He has six sons. One of them Cian, developed MS at University. He could have gone straight into victim mode and felt sorry for himself. Instead he is so grateful for the treatment he receives that this July he is planning to cycle from London to Paris to raise funds for the MS Trust. Well done that man. He anticipates a few falls but says he will simply get up, get on and get going.

Today is going to be a long day in terms of mileage. Megan suggested two villages I should visit as I make my way to my next stop: Portmeirion and Nant Gwrtheyrn.

On the Llyn Peninsular, Nant Gwrtheyrn was closest so I went there first. It is an almost hidden village at the bottom of a secluded, very steep sided valley on the edge of the Irish Sea.

You reach it via a narrow winding road that plunges down to the village.. Currently it is a Welsh Language Centre but it has been renovated from the original quarry village. There are 24 restored cottages.

a heritage centre and a modern and very tasteful cafe/venue that can host up to 80 people.

It has become a popular wedding and family party venue as guests can rent the entire village.

Originally Nant Gwrtheyrn was built for quarrymen and their families in the 1850s, to meet the demand for slate for house building and roads. Everything the villagers needed had to be brought down into the valley via the track on sledges. The quarried slate was taken from the village by boats. The demand for slate fell in the 1930’s and by 1959 there was no-one left and the village was simply left to become derelict. The old chapel is now the heritage centre and there is one cottage that has been restored as it might have looked in the late 1800’s

The next village I visited, close to the town of Porthmadog, could not have been more different. Portmerion is a folly.

It was built by the architect Clough Williams Ellis between 1925 and 1975 to demonstrate how a beautiful site could be developed without spoiling it.

They are closely packed buildings in a sort of Italian style and are very beautiful and highly decorative.

Although many of the houses are just fronts and have no living space, 14 of them can be rented as holiday cottages. There is also a hotel overlooking the sea. It has become a major tourist attraction in part because it is the home of a range of china

...and because in the 1960’s a cult TV series was made there called The Prisoner. His ‘prison’ is now the shop selling the series memorabilia.

There are several restaurants there and a tractor pulled ‘train’ that goes round the grounds, but you can also walk round. It really does look unreal – like a stage set and I loved it.

The road through Snowdonia National Park was wonderful however, sadly, unlike Scotland, Wales does not have strategically placed lay-byes near stupendous views so you flash passed and the first place you can stop to take photos are the sorts of places where you would not chose to stop unless a child in the car was about to be sick down the back of your neck.  Shame that. Nowhere to pull off and feast your eyes on the natural splendour.

Here's a layby...

And another...

Would this feed your soul unless you had a thing about power stations?

That said it is an exceptionally beautiful route, dotted with whitewashed sheep and small grey stone farms plus the added bonus of the occasional petrol station!

On a steep bend in the Dulas valley I nearly missed the perfect stop for a late lunch – The Corriss Craft Centre. It’s a collection of small studio/ shops where the maker artists not only sell their work but also run taster workshops. A great idea.

There was a cafe...

a chocolate studio, a jeweller and a toymaker, a candle dipping studio and a brand new artisan gin distillery!

 

The Dyfi distilleryhad only been open since Easter 2016 and so far have two signature gins: a classic gin made with locally cut bog myrtle

And one called Pollination, a contemporary gin with a multitude of local plants such as gorse and elderberry as its botanicals. They have just taken delivery of a large Spanish wine barrel so that they can keep some of the Pollination gin to mature and age it. It will be called Hibernation. The barrel is going to take a bit of filling as their still only makes eighty bottles at a time. This will be a premium product.

Quarry Pottery, another studio, makes delightful smoking dragons and they are available by post on the internet. www.smokingdragons.co.uk. I will have to get one by post as there is no more room in my car.

They smoke because you place a cone of incense inside. Lovely idea. There were also all kinds of items there for people to paint and collect later.

On to Aberystwyth, a big holiday town on the west coast. Prince Charles went to the University there for a term to learn some Welsh. It’s on a river, has a castle, a pier and a harbour.

Having just been to Portmerion I was surprised to see that this town also has its share of tall brightly coloured houses, not what I usually associate with Wales at all.

But even Aberystwyth did not prepare me for the town of Aberaeron. You come down out of the mountains onto a flat sort of plateau where the farms go right up to the beach. Then you get to the town. What a surprise. COLOUR everywhere

 

Almost every single house except the Tourist Information Office and HSBC which was white and the Town hall which was original grey brown stone.

30 years ago they were offered a grant as an incentive to colour-wash their Georgian town houses. No one gets a grant now but they all still do it for the love of it. I asked about the palette of colour. Did they have a set number of colours from which to choose? No – it was entirely up to the individual. It was like living in a paint box and totally joyful.

On to Cardigan, a pretty market town where I had hoped to post my last few blogs since I’d had no signal or wifi for days. But health and safety rules in Cardigan library and they would not allow me to use my own computer in their electrical sockets. No PAT test no doubt. Irritating since every other library the length of the UK had welcomed me to but I liked the town anyway.

This lack of telephone signal or wifi has been a bit of a problem throughout my journey. It was a problem again now as I was due to turn up at somewhere called Stackpole Estate and unruly Sat. Nav. had deposited me at the gate of a National Trust Property that was firmly closed. I tried the local pub in desperation and the landlady kindly lent me her landline phone so I could ring my new host to get directions.

It was the National Trust Property.

Will and his partner Fran rent an apartment in the only remaining buildings on the Stackpole Estate.

The mansion burnt down years ago but the Trust still manage the extensive grounds, the man made ‘river,’ the bridge and the nearby beach cove. It was stunning.

The flat had bedrooms big enough for a family of four. And they’d still be able to swing the proverbial cat! In the roof of the archway linking two parts of the building was a gap in leading to the roof space where the largest colony of horseshoe bats in Wales roost. They come out at night and get into the trees in the courtyard.

There are wonderful walks on the estate and lots of events are also run in the grounds such as the forthcoming open air Romeo and Juliet theatre production. 

It’s a lovely and peaceful place to live. The community there comprise, Will and Fran who are diving instructors, a nurse, writers, artists, teachers and others who value living in wonderful surroundings.