25 October 2004

Surprises in Wales - Part 2

By Annie Warmke

Writer’s note:  This is part II of the column that appeared last week about Wales.

With all this grandeur and stunning natural beauty of the Snowdonia Mountains our arrival on the vintage train into the bleak town of Blaenau Ffestiniog was quite a surprise.  It sits like an open wound at the end of the line.  Large quarries of unmined slate surround the town – apparently abandoned long ago.  The buildings are grey, seemingly carved from the very rock.  It is hard to see where the town begins and the mine ends.  Grey people sit in the grey streets, isolated and indifferent.  The entire place felt hopeless. 

At one point, during the endless wait for our sandwiches I wandered down near what looked like the main street of the town.  Immediately as I rounded a large building I heard a young man screaming in Welsh, that is until he reached the cuss word portion of his ranting, which was obviously in English.  When I looked in his direction I could see that the object of his verbal abuse was an old woman sitting on a park bench.  She threw her shopping bag at him to make him stop, and he immediately squatted down to pick up the bag and hand it back to her.  The whole scene rattled me because I soon realized this was this woman’s son.  When they saw me watching they quickly jumped up and moved on down the street, continuing to yell and scream at each other.  Strange to take such a beautiful trip to a place I could not wait to leave.

Fortunately our stay was brief.  We finally got our sandwiches, and hopped back on the train.  By the time we passed the waterfall on our decent, the bleakness of Blaenau Ffestiniog was mostly washed from our minds. 

Back in Porthmadog we visited the information center next to the train station because we needed to figure out where we wanted to go from here.  Information centers can be found in large and small towns through Europe.  They provide assistance with things like housing reservations and tourist.  When we enter a town we just look for the brown sign with a lower case “i” and we know we will receive first-rate help.

That evening we found ourselves in a tiny Victorian seaside town of Criccieth, about 30 minutes up the coast.  We could hardly believe our good fortune when we turned left off of the highway and ended up along a shale beach and the loveliest castle ruin we had seen in a long time.  The view of Cardigan Bay and Snowdonia was fabulous. 

The Bay View Guest House (http://www.bayviewsownsite.co.uk) sat proudly above it all and welcomed us for the night.  The hosts welcomed up and led us up three very steep levels of steps to the top of the row house.  All the comforts of home awaited us as we tried to catch our breath from the climb.  Cat settled in to watch cartoons and we set out to explore the beach and the ruins, which required lots more steep climbing.  Travel is not for the faint of heart or spirit.

Criccieth's castle was built at the beginning of the 13th century. The earliest mention of a stronghold on this craggy outcrop is to be found in the Welsh chronicles, the Brut y Tywysogyon, in the year 1239, when Gruffydd ap Llywelyn (son of Llywelyn ap Iorwerth, or "the Great") was imprisoned in the castle by his half-brother, Dafydd. 

Over the years the Welsh and the English have battled for this stronghold, and along the way they have added their own extensions to the castle.  Today Criccieth Castle is in the hands of CADW: Welsh Historic Monuments, and it houses an interesting small museum that tells the history of the castle.

This is a great place to climb around.  The castle sits high above the bay, and the town so the views are breathtaking.  We stared off across the stunningly blue waters, imagining we could see Ireland settled on the horizon.  But it was north, not west that called to us.  We are headed across Wales, and England to Scotland and a real highland wedding.  More adventures to come!