Trip Report: Wales (northern), April 2026, 12 days
Today | 07:39 AM
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Day 7, Wed, 4/22: Sunny and high 50s/low 60s with a breeze
Off to Caernarfon, primarily to see the castle but also walk along the city walls and old town. I remember watching Charles at his investiture as Prince of Wales at Caernarfon Castle in 1969 on TV. Also, this is one of the 4 castles Edward I built and I’ve seen two others so interested to see this person.
Left the house at about 9:30 to avoid traffic! Used my paper map approach, which worked just fine. I parked in the Morrison’s parking lot a bit away from the castle because I didn’t want to drive in tourist clogged streets. Very easy to use pay & display kiosk! I had a leisurely stroll along Victoria Dock observing a variety of boats at the marina. As I was walking down Church Street, I passed St. Mary’s church and the door was open, so in I went. There was some kind of morning coffee/tea group going on but they told me I was free to wander around. Not a whole lot to see inside, but since they had welcomed me I figured I should take some time. This is an active, well used local church so I enjoyed looking at kids’ letters in honor of Remembrance Day; outreach photos to African churches; stained glass and memorial plaques.
Continued down Church Street, looking at the homes with their small front gardens and meandered onto a few side streets. When I reached the castle, there was a huge tour group going in, so I walked around the main square a little bit. Popped into a post office to ask if they have a book rate for shipping books (in case I decide to package up all the books I’ve bought and send them home versus filling up my suitcase); turns out it would be at least $30 to ship them and since I have some room and sufficient weight allowance to put them in my suitcase that’s what I’ll do….so between the suitcase and the backpack, I will be loaded down😁. Gotta laugh at myself, but it’s fun to look for the books in various charity or secondhand shops. Checked out a few charity shops, sat on a bench in the sun and people watched. A very large, pretty square.
I had lunch in a café across from the castle - a very yummy sandwich of Stilton cheese, salami, and sliced grapes on buttered ciabatta roll. Really good so I will try it at home as a nice change from my normal deli cold cuts or curry chicken salad. The visitor info office was next door so I asked her about walking tours or other things to do and she suggested walking up a steep hill near the Morrisons for a great view (I thanked her but thought, “no steep hills for me!”).
This castle is interesting because it was one of the four built by the same person in the same period, you might think they would all have a similar feel. On a prior trip I visited probably the best one of them, Conwy, which was huge and had many, many stairways taking you through all kinds of interconnecting corridors and towers; there were tons of little things to see and nooks and crannies to walk into; there were some railings, but it felt very authentic and old. In fact, that’s where I realized I have a slight case of vertigo because walking along some of those castle walls or spiral staircases, I started feeling sick and dizzy, and had to sit down. The castle I saw this weekend, Beaumaris, is much more ruined, but you can still walk through interior corridors and on the walls. It doesn’t feel like it’s been updated or maintained for tourists - it feels like it’s just there and nature is taking its course (I know they have a maintenance staff and I’m sure they are shoring up sunken areas and making sure it’s safe, but it does not feel like that). On the other hand, in Caernarfon it’s very obvious that it has had a lot of fixing up. I noticed right away that the inner corridors are much higher and wider than they were in either of the other two castles; unless they were built that way for people to ride on horseback through the corridors, I sense some fakery (as in, redone to accommodate school and coach groups). The Royal Welch Fusiliers Museum is located within the castle with free entry included in your castle admission ticket; I had noticed RWF on many gravestones, war memorials and plaques so was interested to learn about this storied regiment. Various uniforms throughout the ages and explanations of the RWF participation in various battles. It doesn’t take long to go through and there’s a RWF shop at the exit. I took a different route back to the car park, ambling along side lanes and noticing the change in era and styles.
As an alternative to the stately homes and gardens, I went to the Inigo Jones Slateworks which was only about 10 minutes away. Wales is the world‘s biggest producer of high-quality slate and they exported something crazy like 200 million tons during the 18th century; demand has reduced by about 90%, but this place is still one of the leading slate workshops. The slateworks initial product was slates for schools and then moved into roof & building tiles, memorials, signage, garden items and commemorative products. They have a self guided audio tour, which is excellent and takes you through all the steps from receiving the slate to finishing/shipping it. You walk through their work yard and into various sheds with huge saws, sanders, planers and lettering machinery. It was amazing to see all the piles of slate waiting to be worked on and then all of the odds and ends and off cuts from pieces they already made. Very interesting and I’m glad I went.
Tomorrow is another stately home and this one should be really good…
Caernarfon - Victoria Docks Marina
Caernarfon Castle - I thought this sign was funny
Inigo Jones Slateworks
Inigo Jones Slateworks - the yard with unused slate and off-cuts
Off to Caernarfon, primarily to see the castle but also walk along the city walls and old town. I remember watching Charles at his investiture as Prince of Wales at Caernarfon Castle in 1969 on TV. Also, this is one of the 4 castles Edward I built and I’ve seen two others so interested to see this person.
Left the house at about 9:30 to avoid traffic! Used my paper map approach, which worked just fine. I parked in the Morrison’s parking lot a bit away from the castle because I didn’t want to drive in tourist clogged streets. Very easy to use pay & display kiosk! I had a leisurely stroll along Victoria Dock observing a variety of boats at the marina. As I was walking down Church Street, I passed St. Mary’s church and the door was open, so in I went. There was some kind of morning coffee/tea group going on but they told me I was free to wander around. Not a whole lot to see inside, but since they had welcomed me I figured I should take some time. This is an active, well used local church so I enjoyed looking at kids’ letters in honor of Remembrance Day; outreach photos to African churches; stained glass and memorial plaques.
Continued down Church Street, looking at the homes with their small front gardens and meandered onto a few side streets. When I reached the castle, there was a huge tour group going in, so I walked around the main square a little bit. Popped into a post office to ask if they have a book rate for shipping books (in case I decide to package up all the books I’ve bought and send them home versus filling up my suitcase); turns out it would be at least $30 to ship them and since I have some room and sufficient weight allowance to put them in my suitcase that’s what I’ll do….so between the suitcase and the backpack, I will be loaded down😁. Gotta laugh at myself, but it’s fun to look for the books in various charity or secondhand shops. Checked out a few charity shops, sat on a bench in the sun and people watched. A very large, pretty square.
I had lunch in a café across from the castle - a very yummy sandwich of Stilton cheese, salami, and sliced grapes on buttered ciabatta roll. Really good so I will try it at home as a nice change from my normal deli cold cuts or curry chicken salad. The visitor info office was next door so I asked her about walking tours or other things to do and she suggested walking up a steep hill near the Morrisons for a great view (I thanked her but thought, “no steep hills for me!”).
This castle is interesting because it was one of the four built by the same person in the same period, you might think they would all have a similar feel. On a prior trip I visited probably the best one of them, Conwy, which was huge and had many, many stairways taking you through all kinds of interconnecting corridors and towers; there were tons of little things to see and nooks and crannies to walk into; there were some railings, but it felt very authentic and old. In fact, that’s where I realized I have a slight case of vertigo because walking along some of those castle walls or spiral staircases, I started feeling sick and dizzy, and had to sit down. The castle I saw this weekend, Beaumaris, is much more ruined, but you can still walk through interior corridors and on the walls. It doesn’t feel like it’s been updated or maintained for tourists - it feels like it’s just there and nature is taking its course (I know they have a maintenance staff and I’m sure they are shoring up sunken areas and making sure it’s safe, but it does not feel like that). On the other hand, in Caernarfon it’s very obvious that it has had a lot of fixing up. I noticed right away that the inner corridors are much higher and wider than they were in either of the other two castles; unless they were built that way for people to ride on horseback through the corridors, I sense some fakery (as in, redone to accommodate school and coach groups). The Royal Welch Fusiliers Museum is located within the castle with free entry included in your castle admission ticket; I had noticed RWF on many gravestones, war memorials and plaques so was interested to learn about this storied regiment. Various uniforms throughout the ages and explanations of the RWF participation in various battles. It doesn’t take long to go through and there’s a RWF shop at the exit. I took a different route back to the car park, ambling along side lanes and noticing the change in era and styles.
As an alternative to the stately homes and gardens, I went to the Inigo Jones Slateworks which was only about 10 minutes away. Wales is the world‘s biggest producer of high-quality slate and they exported something crazy like 200 million tons during the 18th century; demand has reduced by about 90%, but this place is still one of the leading slate workshops. The slateworks initial product was slates for schools and then moved into roof & building tiles, memorials, signage, garden items and commemorative products. They have a self guided audio tour, which is excellent and takes you through all the steps from receiving the slate to finishing/shipping it. You walk through their work yard and into various sheds with huge saws, sanders, planers and lettering machinery. It was amazing to see all the piles of slate waiting to be worked on and then all of the odds and ends and off cuts from pieces they already made. Very interesting and I’m glad I went.
Tomorrow is another stately home and this one should be really good…
Caernarfon - Victoria Docks Marina
Caernarfon Castle - I thought this sign was funny
Inigo Jones Slateworks
Inigo Jones Slateworks - the yard with unused slate and off-cuts
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