A thousand miles and no flat tyres

Just back from Wales, via Scotland.

The Scottish part of the trip was to see my wife’s family. After two nights in Glasgow we then drove to Chester, where my mother now lives.

When my father was alive my parents stayed many times at a family-run country house hotel called Porth Tocyn in Bwlchtocyn near Abersoch in Wales.

They would drive up from Derbyshire, where they lived for over 30 years, and they often spoke fondly of the hotel, and the area.

My mother is 92 now (my father died nine years ago) so I thought it would be nice to take her back to Porth Tocyn, which is just two hours’ drive from Chester, so I booked us in for two nights.

In fact, we went the scenic route through Snowdonia national park so it actually took us the best part of four hours.

Eventually, after driving across miles and miles of moorland with barely another car in sight, we descended to the Llŷn Peninsula via Bala and Ffestiniog.

We then followed the road along the coast, passing through Criccieth and Pwllheli, before arriving in Abersoch.

Bwlchtocyn is a few miles beyond Abersoch and we found the hotel at the top of a hill overlooking Cardigan Bay at the end of a narrow single track road.

It was raining quite hard when we arrived and the weather forecast for Friday and Saturday wasn’t great but, not for the first time in recent weeks, the forecasters got it hopelessly wrong.

As it turned out, the weather could not have been better.

Owned and run by the Fletcher-Brewer family for three generations since 1948, the 17-bedroom Porth Tocyn hotel is ‘reassuringly old-fashioned’, according to the Telegraph:

Exploring the six interconnecting lounges is like exploring someone’s home. Chuck a log on the fire and chat to other guests, cosy-up in a nook with a book or magazine, or pull up a stool in the bar.

An outside terrace with tables and chairs overlooks the sea, and the beach is a 20-minute walk, albeit down quite a steep path. There’s also a heated swimming pool and tennis court.

Apart from one young family, the guests were mostly elderly (ie retired) and some were clearly repeat visitors, like my parents, being on first name terms with staff.

Until I was put right, I thought we were in west Wales. Not so. The Llŷn Peninsula is in north west Wales but here’s the weird thing.

Over three days we didn’t hear a single Welsh accent - not one - either in the hotel (staff or guests) or the nearby town of Abersoch. (We debated whether one couple were speaking Welsh but it could have been something else.)

Most voices sounded English and I got the impression that many visitors were from north west England, hence the ‘Cheshire-by-Sea’ tag that is said to infuriate some local people.

On the return journey yesterday we took the more direct and therefore quicker route back to Chester, following the North Wales’ coast.

We did however make a small detour to check out the seaside resort of Llandudno, which is about an hour from Chester, and what a surprise.

I’m not a big fan of most seaside resorts, many of which have seen better days, but Llandudno looked quite nice.

We didn’t stop because the bright sunshine had brought out the crowds and it was very busy, but we might go back and take a closer look.

Back in Chester, meanwhile, there was a weekend meeting at Chester Races, which meant a further detour to drop my mother off at her flat which is in a development next to the racecourse overlooking the River Dee.

On race days several nearby streets are closed to traffic and many of the residents’ parking bays are commandeered for horse boxes.

Ignoring a man in a yellow hi-vis jacket who shouted, “You can’t park here!” we nevertheless managed to drop my mother off before driving home to Cambridgeshire.

Total mileage since Monday: 1,000 (approx). And no flat tyres.

Below: Porth Tocyn Hotel, Bwlchtocyn