Day 30 - Road Trip Chester - Anglesea - Portmeirion

The timing of this worked out perfectly! My dad hitch-hiked his way from Chester to Snowdonia, then a few days later hitch-hiked to Anglesea for a day trip and back. My original plan was to catch the early morning train from Chester to Holyhead, do a walk there, then catch a bus along the North coast of Anglesea to Almwch then another to Bangor then 2 more to Portmeirion. It was going to be an exhausting and tightly scheduled day but it meant that I could fit in the detour to Anglesea and finish in the right place to begin my last stage, the walk around Snowdonia.

What I hadn't planned for however were the train strikes that almost threw a spanner into the works. As I was trying to figure out how to get around this, my friend Andy asked if he could join the bit of the trip when I go to Portmeirion, and when I told him the situation he had the perfect solution… road trip! The freedom of not being tied down to train and bus timetables meant that we were able to make more stops along the way at various places I’d wanted to visit, plus get to see everywhere at a leisurely pace and more closely follow my dad's route.

We set out from Chester early and joined the A55. It was midsummer’s day, the skies were blue and the sun was shining. And what a day it turned out to be!

Here's how my dad got to Snowdonia…

After this he goes to Caernarvon then Llanberis but I'll get there later. As I explain in the next chapter the rest of my trip covers the same routes he took but in a different order.

My first request stop was at St Winefred’s Well which gives it’s name to the town of Holywell. Although not a stop my dad made, it is one of the Seven Wonders of Wales from the poem he quotes, and the one I had most wanted to visit.

Legend had it that Winefred, a local princess, was beheaded in rage by a spurned suitor and a spring miraculously appeared in the spot where her head fell. When her uncle, St Beuno, placed the head back on her body and prayed for her, she returned to life and lived out her days as a nun with a scar running around her neck. The site has been a place of Catholic pilgramage for 1300 years. There is a pool that you can bathe in and an ornately decorated shrine that surrounds the well. The pool was closed when we went but I managed to fill up my water bottles from the well tap and for the next day or two I exclusively drank holy water!

After Holywell we drove along the smaller coast road (A548) through the towns of Prestatyn and Rhyl before rejoining the A55 at Abergele. Although we missed the Conwy bridges my dad saw (they are invisible from the main road which since 1991 goes under the enormous Conwy tunnel) our detour offered up the handsome blue Foryd Bridge in Rhyl as a consolation prize.

“After Conwy, the scenery becomes wilder….” When the road hugs the coast on a superby sunny day like this you could mistake it for a California coastal freeway. We went through the tunnels which take only Westbound traffic - the 2 lanes of Eastbound traffic go around the coastline on the old road, so its a different experience in reverse, as I shall find out on my return drive at the end.

Before going through Bangor itself I had my second request stop… Penrhyn Castle, for no other reason than it looked like a cracker of a castle and we had the time to explore. It turned out to be a magnificent monster of a building, designed to impress the ladies rather than hold off a seige.

I had no idea when I went that it would turn out to be such a fitting stop for a journey in my dad’s honour. For the last thing I expected to find housed inside the castle building itself was none other than a railway museum with several full-sized steam trains! You couldn't have made it up!

My favourite was the Fire Queen, seen here in green, which carried slate from the Dinorwic mine at Llanberis.

Next we circled the castle grounds and stopped to play frisbee on a lawn to one side. It was a great spot for a chuck!

Back on the road, and we crossed the Britannia Bridge to the island of Mon.

My dad’s day trip here, hitchhiking with a family on holiday…

The first thing I noticed about Anglesey was how flat it was.

We stuck to the A55 all the way to Holyhead, with the scenery changing little. Holyhead itself is quite run down, and outwith the busy harbour area there wasn't much activity. I was surprised to see a boarded up Woolworths - the chain closed down in 2009 which means this prime town-centre retail unit has sat empty for 13 years.

We drive to the far end of the town and parked up by The Boathouse Hotel. They had outdoor seats so we had a quick refreshment stop looking out at the yachts in the harbour.

Then it was time for the walk, out to the South Stack Lighthouse. We followed a path through purple gorse to the top of high cliffs then along the coast to the lighthouse. The weather was perfect - the sea and sky met in a dazzling shimmer of pinks and purples.

A long winding staircase led down to the lighthouse, though it was closed by the time we reached it so we couldn't go to the very end.

The way back had sweeping views across the cliffs and the whole of Anglesey, the mountains of Snowdonia visible as ghostly shadows on the horizon.

On the way back we left the main road and drove around the North side of the island, following where my dad had hitch-hiked.

It was a lovely drive and I was able to spot most of the things he saw…alas a few minutes in, my phone battery died, and lacking the right cable to charge in the car, I was unable to take any pictures after the first part.

We had a funny moment trying to decide what on earth a particularly weird looking building was… it turned out to be The Star of the Sea!

We left Anglesey by the “real” Menai bridge. Having crossed it, we parked up and Andy got his camera out and took some shots - he’s a professional photographer hence why for the next while the pictures are a lot better!

And after this last stop we got on the road again, with no more stops before Portmeirion. My dad went close by but didn't go there - this was my own addition, being a big fan of The Prisoner. I’d watched the entire series in the weeks running up to the trip. I won't give you any background to Portmeirion - you can look all that up yourself - suffice to say it’s the most fabulous folly ever built, a fantasy Italianate villiage combining architectural styles from ancient Rome to English country village, Indian temple and Islamic dome.

We were met at the entrance by a couple of weirdly suspicious looking men in a golf cart whom we had to follow to our room. Already things were unintentionally reminiscant of The Prisoner!

I had previously understood that there were 2 hotels in Portmeirion - one in Castle Deudreath (the hospital from the show) and the other down by the harbour in the village itself. In fact it turns out the entire village is a hotel, with rooms located in many of the buildings. When we reached our room in Bridge House 3, we discovered we had one of the best views in the whole place! We looked right down onto the town square, piazza and the giant chessboard!

We dropped our things and went to explore. It was so exciting and surreal being in The Village, especially as the daytime visitors had left (it closes at 4) so only the hotel guests remained. We basically had the run of the place to ourselves! Everywhere you look are fantastical buildings and sculptures, and not only that, the views across Tremadoc bay are worth going there for alone.

We had a drink at the pub/restaurant (second last pic above) looking out over the bay. It was a superb spot to relax in, and with the weather as it was - a perfect midsummer’s eve - we may as well have been in Southern Italy. The prices for dinner were exorbitant however, and as it’s the only place to eat there, we decided to go to Porthmadoc for dinner. At this point my phone was charged and Andy’s camera battery had died so the photos return to the usual quality!

Dad liked Porthmadoc but my experience, arriving there on a Tuesday night (Tue being the day most restaurants were closed didn’t help) was of a rough and miserable little place. We parked next to a group of enormously overweight, tracksuit clad locals, sat on a step drinking vodka poured into energy drinks and smoking bubblegum flavoured vapes.

We found an Indian restaurant, about the only place open, and ordered some food. Our waiter looked like a comic book villian with hellishly dead eyes and I wondered what sort of things they must have seen to become so hardened. I have rarely ever been so unnerved by a person just by looking at them. Sat opposite us was a gruff thug of a character and his forlorn wife. He acted like he was the big man of the town, whilst everyone else humoured him. He berated the manager for not having John Smiths on tap (at an Indian restaurant!) before declaring, “Me and the wife love a pint of John Smiths down The Red Lion, don’t we love?” She said nothing but meekly nodded and I wondered if he had ever stopped to consider whether she might not enjoy his favourite pasttime as much as he does.

The food was so fine, though Andy wiped himself out on a small but deadly chilli, hidden in an otherwise mild sauce. He spent the best part of ten minutes with his mouth on fire. I could only be glad that for once it wasn’t me!

We got the hell out of the town as fast as possible, and enjoyed the sunset across the wide expanse of the bay on the return drive.

Back in Portmerion we took a night-time stroll around the town. By now the restaurant had closed and the village was deserted and eerily silent. Apart from the distant sounds from passing rooms where a few people sat awake, chatting or watching “Prisoner TV”, the hotel’s own channel showing The Prisoner on repeat, there was total stillness. I’ll never forget roaming this giant fantasy world, admiring the sheer vision of Clough-Williams Ellis for ever undertaking such a fanciful yet arguably important project. He was a fierce critic of the loss of traditional country life to urbanism, and wanted to create the perfect village. Every detail is perfect - even the trees and vegetation are immaculately landscaped. Yet it’s also an illusion, a dream somehow made solid. At night this wonderfully decadent folly is especially enchanting.

After amusing ourselves in this giant playground until long after midnight, we retired to bed. The last thing my eyes saw before closing was this image - the play of the lamplight through the windows onto the celling above. Utterly bewildered and overwhelmed by the place, I fell quickly into the worlds of the beyond.