Communion Of Dreams

Part 1. Part 2. Part 3.

That’s the famous Laburnum Arch at Bodnant Garden in North Wales. Calling it an ‘arch’ is somewhat misleading, since it’s actually 55 meters long. Here’s a better image of it from Wikipedia:

We decided to kick off our week in North Wales with a trip to Bodnant Garden, particularly since Martha knew that the Arch would be in bloom. She’s wanted to see it in it’s full glory since we first went there almost 20 years ago.

And much of the rest of the garden was in bloom, as well:

If you plan a trip to Wales, particularly anywhere in the north, you really should include Bodnant in your itinerary.

After enjoying the garden, we decided to pop into Conwy for a bit of lunch, enjoying the old town, and seeing the amazing City Walls:

(Not my images, found on Google.)

From there, we decided to drive back to our cottage in Dolgellau via Betws-y-Coed, so we could check out Swallow Falls:

And here’s some video of it:

The next morning we headed to Ynys Môn, more commonly known in English as Anglesey. The first stop was St Seiriol’s Well, Penmon. We visited the well:

Then checked out the medieval dovecot, and went out to the beach for a nice stroll. We drove further inland to check out a site I had again *thought* that I had visited previously, but that turned out to be only in my fiction: the Lligwy Burial Chamber, a neolithic burial site. And nearby is the Lligwy hut group, a Roman-era defensive village which is really quite delightful, even if it is only foundations:

After the Hut Group, we stopped at a roadside pub for some lunch, then went exploring Anglesey, taking in the views, hopping fences to get up close to some wind mills, and enjoying the many scattered Standing Stones.

Jim Downey