It was Friday, the last day of my trip, the sun was shining and I needed some breakfast after a reasonable night’s sleep and a predictably impossible shower! I was going to find a coffee shop for breakfast, but none of them seemed to open until 10:00am so Cafe Nero came to the rescue.
These two panoramas show the length of the sea front at Llandudno. The one below is a bit of fun as my software is not up to constructing such a shot in perspective – I think there were about 14 individual images stitched together to construct it.
So on to the pier, a walk to the end, a visit to Mini Figures for presents, the tram to the summit, more gifts purchased in the shop and then a descent (somewhat scary) to Llandudno for lunch.
The observant amongst you might have noticed that Llandudno has a thing about Alice in Wonderland – not sure why, but the statues were very good. [Update: If you go back to 1861, the eight year old Alice Pleasance Liddell (the real ‘Alice’ in Wonderland) spent the first of many summer holidays in Llandudno. Her holiday home ‘Penmorfa’, was built on Llandudno’s West Shore. The Liddells were close family friends with Charles Dodgson, who wrote the books under his more famous pen-name, Lewis Carroll.]
However, I was not going to do “The Alice Trail”, my objectives for the day were to visit the pier and go up the Great Orme on the council owned Tramway. Which of course I did taking video clips of parts of my descent.
I did however make up for the previous night’s F&C experience by having excellent Cod and Chips at the Fish Tram Cafe beside the Great Orme Tramway station. What was exceptionally outstanding was the pot of tea, with ample hot water, and milk provided for £2.50. That’s a very fair price for a drink, and I think others should follow their lead.
Having started this series of posts with a horrific image of myself. It seems only fitting to end the last post (apart from the Long Journey Home), with another one of me on the top of the Great Orme which I found to be surprisingly flat.
When I’d been planning this trip, I had originally thought to just do a one-way trip from Porthmadog to Caernarfon, after doing a return trip on the Ffestiniog Railway, and spending a night in Caernarfon, or Bangor. The intention then was to do a there and back trip on the Vale of Conway line from Llandudno.
Just goes to show that you can’t underestimate the role of planning and careful examination of timetables!! It became apparent that a return trip to Caernarfon, two-nights stay in Tremadog, and a single trip to Blaenau Ffestiniog and then a one-way ticket to Llandudno on the Vale of Conway was both a much easier, more logical and actually cheaper option – with the added advantage of two trips on the Welsh Highland Railway.
So here I was again in Porthmadog at the Ffestiniog and Welsh Highland Railway station having a coffee and a teacake in Spooner’s – their cafe. Once again I’d decided not to take the breakfast at the Golden Fleece Inn.
The Ffestiniog Railway was the original venture in Porthmadog, and they’d had to re-model the station quite considerably to accommodate the Welsh Highland line as well. As I was a one-way passenger, I was pointed towards a special carriage for those of my intention. I was the only passenger in the carriage, and I had indicated when booking that I was considering getting off at Tanygrisiau and walking up to the quarry, Cwmorthin waterfall and lake. After talking to the Guard on the train, and thinking a bit more about it, I decided not to be brave (or foolish) and just do the straight trip to Blaenau Ffestiniog and then the TfW train down to Llandudno.
I was becoming much wiser and less adventurous!!!
The images above give a flavour of the lovely train trip with fantastic vistas to look at all through the journey – and the sun was shining as well. Perhaps the most interesting part of the trip was the loop at Dduallt, where after you leave the station, the track loops back on itself to achieve elevation before crossing the track and proceeding to Blaenau Ffestiniog.
The entrance to Blaenau Ffestiniog – quite impressive!
Blaenau Ffestiniog
So I arrived in Blaenau Ffestiniog. The narrow gauge railway shares the station with the mainline service, so potentially no problems about rushing to get a connection … only there wasn’t one. This was the only point in the trip where I’d not researched the connections and there was nearly a 2hr wait for a Vale of Conway train. If I’d wanted a bus, no problem. There was a bus waiting in the bus station next to the railway station which could have taken me to Bangor, but no train. Still, there was plenty of time to get lunch at a pub and have another pint – perhaps because I was near to their “homeland” I might even be able to get an Old Tom on draught (Robinsons of Stockport).
But no. The only pub was closed for renovation, as was the Hotel. I walked the length of Blaenau Ffestiniog looking for one, nothing to be found, and I wasn’t going to pay £2 to get a guest membership of the Royal Welsh Fusiliers Club for a pint of John Smiths!! So it was back to the station, a wary descent of some broken step paving stones and a long wait! Whilst I waited a TfW ground staff worker came by to cut some grass. Not the best thing for me as Very High Grass Pollen had been forecast anyway, So I put a mask on to reduce the possibility of an asthma attack. See … I was prepared!!
It was nice to chat to someone though and I think it was about then that I realised how few people I’d actually talked to. The staff in the Athro Lounge in Aberystwyth, Richard, the gentleman on the Talyllyn Railway who I also saw and talked to the following day on the WHR, the barman in the Black Boy Inn in Caernarfon and the Guard on the train that day.
Eventually the train arrived and I was on my way again.
The Vale of Conway was an interesting experience. After emerging from a tunnel that seemed to go on for ever we began a downhill descent which prompted me to ask Perplexity whether there were any uphill gradients on the way down to Llandudno Junction. Apparently there were, but I didn’t notice them.
The second part of the trip takes you down into the Vale of Conway past Betws-y-Coed and Llanrwst. It was just pleasant to be able to sit still, look out the window and not think about taking pictures, although I did have it in mind that it would be good to see if I could get a shot of the Castle and the tubular and suspension bridges. Perhaps as we approached Llandudno Junction there would be an opportunity?
… and there was. The suspension bridge engineered by Thomas Telford to carry the London to Holyhead road, across the Afon Conwy stands alongside its more recent replacement and the tubular bridge designed by Robert Stephenson to carry rail traffic were both visible as was Conwy Castle from the train as it approached Llandudno Junction.
Tubular & Suspension bridges
Jenny and I are possibly going to return to Llandudno in the autumn, so there will be opportunities for us to explore these three wonderful structures.
So I’d arrived in Llandudno. It was only a short walk from the station to The Parade where I found The Marine Hotel cloaked in scaffolding. Not the best start to my stay, I thought. Luckily, my room (which was minute with a shower that I could hardly get into, and could wash my hands in the sink if I was standing in the shower, or sitting on the toilet) faced out over the sea, and whilst being on the third floor (but with a lift), did not have any scaffold outside the window.
I decided to go out for a walk, go to a recommended Fish’n’Chips restaurant – Tribells , and get my bearings. I was not impressed by Tribells. The chips were overcooked and the hake was overcooked at one end – an issue I recognise is a problem for blocky fish that requires a bit of frying to cook all the way through. However, it was expensive at £21 with a glass of Pinot.
I walked towards the Great Orme looking for a pub that was rumoured to have Timothy Taylor Landlord, and I found it – The Snowdon, and I had two pints there before making my way back to The Marine.
