Wales is one of the countries of Great Briton along with England and Scotland. Cymru, the Welsh name for the country, is well known for it’s rugged coastline, breathtaking national parks, distinctive Welsh language and Celtic culture.
When we started looking into visiting wales, we realised that there were so many things to do, places to go, villages to visit, different hikes to do… We couldn’t choose one over the others! So, we decide to put the camping equipment together, rent a car and do a road trip. We love that! For 5 days we explored this country, driving north, over the different regions. On the map on the right you can see the details of our road trip.
Day one - It's all about the breakfast!
We started our road trip in the last day of July, on a sunny morning. Bristol was the staring point. Why Bristol? First, because they have The Bristolian Cafe – the best place for Breakfast in UK! It’s a cosy and friendly cafe with very good choice of freshly prepared food in good value and comprises good quality. Even though what we ordered was excellent, we found ourselves wishing we’d ordered some of the other items we saw being delivered to the other tables! It was our second time there, but we’ll just have to go back again! Second and last, Bristol was very close to Wales, more precisely, to the Brecon Beacons National Park.
The Brecon Beacons National Park was one of the first ten national parks to be created in Britain. The intention was to safeguard the beautiful, rough and dramatic landscapes. We could witness that a soon we started driving inside this park.
Our first pit stop was at Cwm Porth, the starting point for a beautiful hike call the Four Falls Trail (Parking for the day is £4). This trail leads to 4 different waterfalls on the river Mellte: Sgwd Clun-Gwyn, Sgwd Isaf Clun-Gwyn, Sgwd y Pannwr and Sgwd-yr-Eira. We really enjoyed this trail and we highly recommend it! It’s a lovely 5.5 miles walk, which whilst challenging in parts, is certainly fine for anyone with moderate levels of fitness and decent footwear. Each of the waterfalls is spectacular and there is so much wildlife around, you do get a genuine feel of being really out in the wild.
After exploring the waterfalls, we started our way to Laugharne, a small town where we would find a camping ground to spend the night.
But before that, we still had many miles to go. We drove past amazing villages, up to the mountains in small, winding back roads, stopping every 5min to take photos of the breathtaking views. All those things that make a road trip so amazing.
A good lesson learned that night was that all the restaurants in Wales close by 09 pm! Ok, not all, but you get the idea. So if you’re really looking forward for a nice and warm meal at the local pub, make sure you get there before then. We learned the hard way.
Day two - Time to go to town.
After a rainy night, on our second day in Wales we drove through the costal line from Laugharne to Aberystwyth. We started the day exploring Tenby, a beautiful harbour town in southwest Wales.
Our next stop was St Davis, an iconic city situated on the far south west coast of Wales. We really recommend spending a couple of hours there. We enjoyed walking around the colourful streets, full of character. St Davids Cathedral and the magnificent ruins of the medieval Bishops Palace are a must see. And because the wether gave us a little sunshine, we decided to check out one of the many beautiful beaches in the area.
Driving around the costal line was so beautiful. From St Davis up to Aberystwyth we stop so many times to enjoy the views, take photos, speak with the locals… Everyone is so friendly! We arrived at Aberystwyth just on time to set up the tent and go for dinner, so when we got to explored the city was already dark.
Day three - From the coast to the mountains
On the third day of the trip we packed our tent and swap the sea side for beautiful mountains, and that includes Snowdonia National Park. On the map above check the roads that we did between Aberystwyth and Caernarfon. We really recommend that route due to breathtaking landscapes, magical lakes, a forest of giant trees and cute sheeps everywhere…
After a long day driving, we found The Black Boy Inn. It’s a restaurant in Caernarfon, the best one of the entire trip! When we got there the restaurant was full. It’s very popular with locals and tourists, but we had a table very quick. Firstly, the staff is excellent, secondly the place is spotless with very particularly decoration, and finally the food is delicious, uncomplicated, well cooked/thought out and good value.
Day four- Time for some Cake... And Domino's...
This was a special day. It was Nélia’s BIRTHDAY.
Today we were going to spend the night in the same camping so, for the first time, we didn’t had to pack our tent. The plan was to drive around Isle of Anglesey. We didn’t had many stops planed along the way, and we were out just to enjoy the views. This was a really good thing, as we soon found out. Parking on any of the many touristic places along the way was always at least £5, even if it was just 15min. Let’s just say we skipped a few…
Halfway through the day we got to South Stack Lighthouse. An amazing lighthouse featured in many films and tv shows. It does feel out of this world and it’s worth a visit. After that, it was time to start our return journey. Along the way we still stopped in an almost desert beach, where we had some birthday cake to celebrate this special day.
At the end of the day we came back to Snowdonia National Park where we still decided to do a quick hike in Ogwen Valley.
Oh, and do you still remember the lesson we learn on the first day about the restaurants and the closing times? Well, we kind of forgot. The idea we had was to go back to the same pub we’ve been to the night before, but it was already 9pm when we finished the hike. We looked around to see what we could find still open, but no pub was serving food at 9:30. Even Burger King was closed when we got there by 10pm. Last option, Domino’s. So we finished the day eating pizza by the river overlooking the Menai Bridge.
Day five- Hiking is fun, but we took the train.
On our last day we explore Snowdon, the highest mountain in Wales and England with 1080 metres above sea level. To do it we choose to catch the train up from Llanberis Station and walk down the Llanberis Path.
Once at the top there is a cafe/restaurant and toilet facilities. We didn’t know this but those spaces become very handy as we could prepare our selfs for the next few steps to reach the summit and then start our way down.
Our day down was smooth, there are areas that are quite steep and slippery, so make sure that you have proper walking shoes, and we also realised that the weather changes suddenly. On the start was very windy and foggy, but them improved and the sun came. All the way down the views are stunning.
We highly recommend train up and walk back, the train its a fun experiencie and gives you the energy to enjoy the views on your way down.
Snowdon was one of the main reasons to visit Wales. After the descent, we felt the road trip was over. We were just going to camp one last night and drive back to London in the morning.
But Wales still had one more secret to reveal.
That evening, after setting our tent in the worst camping ever, we went for dinner. Despite not being our first choice, we happily ended up at The Dudley Arms Hotel. It was a Friday night and the pub was very quiet with just a couple of busy tables on one of the rooms. But being in a small village, that was to be expected. While we were there, the pub started to get a little busy. Although the food was amazing, no one was there for dinner. Most people would come in and join the biggest table there. But before doing that they would visit a smaller table, where a group of 5 people had some papers out. Every time someone would come in, they would stop by, wright something on those papers, and give some money to the people on the small group. After almost one hour of this, we couldn’t figure out what was happening and we were getting very curious. We had to ask someone…
When our waitress came to check if the food was good, we just had to ask. She looked around quickly to see if anyone was looking at us, sat down on our table, and said in a very Attenborough’s way:
“Those are the locals…”
Pubs are a key element of the community life throughout the United Kingdom. Wales is no exception. With so many farmers and people living in isolated places, the Friday night game of lottery is an excuse to go to the pub and be with friends. Just make sure you’re there before 9pm if you want some food.
1000 Miles in 5 days. What a great road trip.
There was rain, sun, wind, great food and super nice people. Thank you Wales!
