Wales – The Secret Gem of the UK!

It was early December when we first found out that going to London for Justin’s work was a very real possibility. He had gone twice before, but my job had always prevented me from tagging along. But wait! This trip was a new story! I’m at a new job where it’s a lot more flexible with time off. Could it be? Could we really be going to the UK?

We quickly decided that we were going to need to take a couple weeks and explore a bit more. I mean really, why not take advantage of his free flight and make a vacation of it? Of course, one stipulation to this trip was that Justin was going to have to work like a maniac in the months ahead of the trip just to be able to show off the parts he’s working on (I’d give you more details but it’s strictly hush hush… that and I don’t really want to bore you with the sometimes snooze worthy details of his big engineering work…) So, that means I’m on my own for all the planning involved!

We decided that we wanted to explore Wales. Scotland was a very real possibility for a few days, but then we decided that we had been to Edinburgh in 2010… and we loved it too much. We’d be too tempted to stick around places we’d already been, and we wanted to explore a bit more of the UK. On the same 2010 Edinburgh trip, we also visited the Lake District and northern England… so if we didn’t want to get off the island, Wales it would be.

Now, I’m not saying we felt any real calling to the country. I didn’t know anything about it. Not really, at least. I have a friend who studied abroad there and she didn’t do a whole lot of traveling, so that wasn’t a huge source of information. Her main bit of advice was to stay away from the bigger cities of Swansea and Cardiff because there wasn’t much there to see, and they were just big, dirty cities. (Disclaimer: we didn’t actually go to either of these cities besides seeing them through the train windows… so don’t be upset!) There were a few websites with some info, but, well, not a lot of info. It just seemed like Wales is a destination for Londoners who are looking for a week away, perhaps on the “beach”.

But, as I researched more, I realized it sounded like a great place. Tons of scenery (which we love!), some great outdoor trails (which we also love!), tons of castles (sometimes called “The Castle Capital of the World”, there are some 400 castles in this small country, of which over 100 are still standing!) I figured this alone was enough to warrant a visit, especially since we were going to be right near there already!

So, here I am, armed with a few tourism sites, trying to plan a trip. Oh, and did I mention we didn’t want to have a car? We wanted to take public transportation around the country. Justin said he’d be stressed from working and so why not just take trains and busses? How hard could it be? (Don’t listen to the naysayers who kept telling me in public forums that we NEEDED a car to get around… we didn’t!)

And, while it was tons of work, I planned an amazing journey. I started looking at the places I just KNEW we had to see (climbing Mount Snowdon in Snowdonia National Park, wandering the coastline in some cute little cities, and Justin really wanted to go on a canalboat over the Pontcysylite aqueduct – which was the only thing he said he wanted to do for the whole trip, so I knew that was a necessary stop!) And then, I just kind of set up the cities we’d stay around that, keeping in mind where the trains and busses were going to stop.

I knew we wanted to see mostly the sights in the north, so we stayed up there as long as possible. We made a base for ourselves for 4 nights in a quaint little Victorian-esque city called Llandudno (thlan-did-no from how I was taught to say it… Welsh is an impossible language!!!!!!) We took the bus down to Aberystwyth (ah-ber-WRIST-with, as the English taught me, there’s a wrist in it!), and then took a train down to Tenby (ah yes, ten-bee, just like you’d guess! Although, the Welsh name was something impossible as well…) We stayed on the coast and went along the western edge of the country. We saw millions of sheep, with the littlest of lambs bounding after their mothers, frolicking on the green and yellow pastures. We saw castles – lots and lots of castles. And we saw coastline. Harbors lined with bright, colorful houses; and stretches of sandy beaches to rival any Californian spot; and waves beating against ragged rocks. It was absolutely gorgeous.

 

I think my favorite part was the castle we explored in Conwy. Maybe it was because we stopped at a pub for lunch beforehand and discovered “Old Rosie”, a scrumpy, cloudy cider (I don’t know what that means… besides the fact that it was delicious!) that was a strong 7.3% alcohol. Or maybe not. We termed our adventure “Drunk Castle-ing”, and for a small fee we were let loose in a crumbling, yet fairly sturdy castle, built between 1283 and 1289. Seriously, they just let you loose. You can climb up to the top of the tallest spires of the lookouts and view off into the distance on the seas. And you can climb the stairs into King Richard II’s secret hiding spot when the castle was under siege in 1399, overlooking a small chapel where the priests stood and prayed for safety. I loved this freedom to explore, as it felt like I could really live and experience history, as opposed to visiting the Tower of London and feeling corralled through the rooms like cattle.

Me at the top of a tall spire of Conwy Castle, enjoying the views!

Here I am, at the top of one of the spires, happily drunk castle-ing!

Justin’s favorite part of the trip was climbing Mount Snowdon (Yr Wyddfa in Welsh), and this was a very close second for me. We are fairly adventurous and love hiking and the outdoors, so when we stayed with a friend in Oxford on our way to Wales, he told us we just HAD to go up Crib Gogh. This trail was the most difficult way up the mountain, but we figured “Hey, we’re experienced! We’ve climbed up Humphreys Peak in Flagstaff! We’ve got this!” Ahem. Right.

Justin hiking along the trail of Crib Gogh… the clouds helped keep my fear of heights at bay!

Yeah… this is the trail. You don’t see it?

Luckily, we found a group of internationals, one of which had climbed up Crib Gogh numerous times, and he was generous enough to let us join their group. Otherwise, there is NO WAY I would have trusted we were going the right way. Map or not, this was sketchy. Thankfully, we were in the misty clouds for most of our hike, so we had no idea how high up we were. That is, until the view cleared just near the top. And the entire way down, we hiked looking up at the crazy ridge line we followed the whole way. Maybe we should have bought better travel health insurance?

 

The view from near the top of Mount Snowdon, in Snowdonia National Park

The peak of Mount Snowdon is a tall 3560 ft above sea level, which doesn’t sound too impressive until you see the trails. Our sweet B&B owners in Llandudno told us about how they made a couple 20-something girls go back upstairs and change out of their high heels for the ascent to the top (I can only assume the girls didn’t make it on their hike. Even the other, less challenging trails to the top are fairly difficult and rocky. Unless they took the train up, which yes, there is a train to the summit… it runs during the summer months and you can grab a cuppa at the visitor center at the top. However, both of which were closed when we were there in April.)

 

Anyways, I hope I’ve convinced you to at least consider visiting Wales. While it may not have the same unspoiled beauty as parts of Scotland, it has a beautiful, unique charm to it. The people were all incredibly friendly and happy to share their country with us. There were not many tourists to have to fight for the best sites. And we saw so many beautiful places taking just trains and busses! There was also this nifty pass that we paid a flat fee for 4 days train travel and 8 days bus travel, so it was really affordable! We stayed in B&Bs every night with a fabulous, huge Welsh breakfast every morning, and it was around $100/night. While I’m sure we could have spent less, we wanted to relax and have some nicer places to sleep. The food and drink was a bit pricier, but still considerably less than London.

All in all, I hope to go back and see some other places we weren’t able to see on this trip over. Perhaps I’ll see you over there!