A trip to Wales and Chester, Part 2

Day 2

The next morning, after a hearty Welsh breakfast with eggs, bacon, sausages and baked beans and lots of tea, we took our hired car and started on an anti-clockwise tour around Anglesey. North to Amlwch, then Cemaes, Llanfairynghornwy, Llanfaethlu, Llanfachraeth… (The Welsh word llan, by the way, means ‘church’ or ‘village’, hence all those Llans.) We were never far from the sea, which of course makes a perfect background to the green meadows with all the cows and sheep.

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Then, on the Western end of Anglesey, on Holy Island, we paid a visit to Holyhead, the lovely town that is famous for being the ferry port to Dublin, Ireland – on our next trip in September, we’ll actually take the boat and go across the Irish Sea!

Next, in between Rhosneigr and Aberffraw, we came to a beach which was quite busy with families enjoying a day out – we had about 25°C that day, which by Welsh standards is real bathing weather! Along with some other walkers, we took a path up a hill next to the beach, taking photos of the breath-taking landscape around us all along. And when we reached the top of that hill, we realised we were actually standing on top of one of the most famous and important prehistoric burial chambers in Wales: Barclodiad y Gawres! Unfortunately, it wasn’t open at the time, but next time I’ll tell you about its equivalent on the other side of Anglesey, which we visited the day after and were actually able to enter…

At tea time, we reached Aberffraw, another place with a long history: it was the residence of the Welsh kings of Gwynedd from Arthurian days until the subjugation of Wales by Edward I ‘Longshanks’ of England. Sadly, after having been excavated and evaluated by archaeologists, the remains of the old castle were buried again – they’re now underneath the local store… Anyway, we found a lovely old-fashioned tea room, with scones, bara brith, cream tea – and, of course, a bilingual sign: Ystafelloedd Te – Tea Rooms!

Well, being a ‘tourist’, I wanted to take a couple of photos of one of the most famous Welsh features – sheep! There are 9 million of them in Wales, did you know that? And, even though it’s not at all easy to stop along those country roads on Anglesey, my darling managed, and I did get my sheep photos…

We’d almost completed our Anglesey tour when we came to Menai Bridge (Porthaethwy) again, where we’d crossed from the Welsh mainland the day before – and we got a great view of that important suspension bridge built by Thomas Telford in 1826 to connect Ynys Mon to the rest of the world!

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In the evening, my knowledgeable darling took me to Red Wharf Bay (Traeth Coch) for dinner; the place is famous for its cosy old inns and their seafood meals. And I had a pot of mussels in cream sauce there – and believe me, it WAS great!