June 13, 2017: Cemaes to Church Bay

Long ago my in-laws, Naomi and Adrian, had agreed that our completion of the Isle of Anglesey Coastal Path would have to be deferred to another expedition, one which we now got under way on this warm June day in 2017. We had two stages still needed to get from Cemaes to Llanfachraeth but we would add to these two the first three days on the Pembrokeshire Coast Path.

I had toyed with the idea of actually getting in a few miles of walking on arrival day for there were a number of problems with the Cemaes to Church Bay section. We all remembered that the 9.5 miles listed in the guidebook for the transit from Moelfre to Llaneilian had turned out to be 13.5 miles and that, even with a shortcut on roads, we had arrived at our pick-up point only at 6:50 in the evening. Now we would face 10.5 miles (or so it said) in a remote countryside, one which also included passage over a causeway affected by high tides. My decision not to walk on arrival day, however, was predicated on several factors: there seemed to be no useful early pick-up point for a taxi after the closure of the local nuclear plant; it looked like high-tide would arrive only after we had crossed the causeway; we could make a far earlier start this time than last year, and, in any event, there was a massive headland that could be circumvented (as opposed to circumnavigated) with some mile-saving road walking.

Therefore all we had to do on the first day of our expedition, June 12, 2017, was get us back to Cemaes itself. A minicab picked us up at 11:00 and we were soon clambering through Euston Station (where we actually found some places to sit down.) Our train left at 12:10 and we travelled without incident as far as Chester, where, at 14:13 there was only a short time to use lifts to get our bulky luggage to the platform for the 14:24 train to Holyhead. Here I noticed that the seat reservation tickets I had purchased at Paddington a few weeks earlier, actually bore no seat numbers! I showed these to an Arriva guard on the platform and he suggested that, no, Arriva doesn’t sell such tickets – except perhaps on their website. He told me in which carriage there were likely to be unclaimed seats and we were soon comfortably seated. I have always enjoyed this stretch of track – along the north Wales coast – and we passed many spots familiar to us, including quite a few on Anglesey itself. We arrived at Holyhead at 16:18 and headed for the parking lot, where I had asked Nathan of Celtic Trails to have a cab waiting for us.

Soon Dylan was negotiating the back roads of the island, with a running commentary on the local scene. He said he had recently spent some time in Manchester but the pace was too hectic and he was glad to be home. By 5:00 or so we were back at the Woburn Hill Hotel, where we had spent two nights the previous year, and I had paid Dylan £35, including tip, for our ride. (As Adrian had paid most of the Celtic Trails bill I repaid my share by serving as trip treasurer for the rest of the week.) They remembered us at the hotel and Adrian carried my heavy case to the top floor again – though my room faced a different direction this time.

I suggested that we might have a look at the town again; I wanted to see how we might get started the next day by locating the narrow road at the side of the Stag pub and by descending for some superb views at harbor-side. Then it was back to this pub itself for a nice gin and tonic – as Adrian began his perpetual quest for local specialties in the food and drink category. The Stag was a friendly establishment, one that prided itself on being Wales’ northernmost pub. A couple from Manchester, with a big dozy dog everyone had to step over, quizzed us on our walking plans.

Back at the hotel we entered the dining room at 7:00 or so – I had a mild curry – and with a lot of daylight still available – we climbed to our rooms for an early night.

Looking through my skylight I tried to convince myself that skies were brightening at dawn – there were some signs of recent moisture and visibility was not that great. We ate our breakfast at 8:00 or so with food choices soon receiving a dominant pattern: after cereal, fruit and juices Naomi had poached eggs on toast, I had scrambled eggs on toast and egg-phobic Adrian enjoyed his bacon and beans. We would be returning for a second night to this hotel so little care had to be taken with packing and at 8:45, under cloudy skies, we were ready to make our departure. After so many anxieties about today’s venture I was eager to see if it could be done.

Passing along the colorful shades of paint on the houses of the main street of Cemaes we noted what a contrast there was between last year’s sunny, crowded scene and the near emptiness of the place today. We rounded the harbor on tarmac and sought out a paved footpath at the far end. Instructions from the guidebook by Carl Rogers were detailed at this point (though not always later on) and we rose to a stone cottage and had our first view of the open waters ahead of us. Because instructions were often printed in small type on blue backgrounds I had again re-typed and re-sized these and Adrian had a copy in his map case, along with an OS map at an inch to the mile. I had a copy too and the two-and-a-half-inch to the mile map – though this was hard to fold and we often walked off my map. At least I remembered my map case this time – I had forgotten it last summer in the Wye Valley.

While still in the environs of Cemaes itself we now headed for the unlovely presence of the decommissioned Wylfa Power Station, passing around the back of the first in an innumerable series of bays – though this one did not require much in the way of descent and ascent. As usual Adrian, now dressed in a safari-like brown shirt, was well ahead of us with, with Naomi, still wearing her bright blue raincoat and me, in a new brick-colored hooded sweatshirt, bringing up the rear.

We were overtaken by another walking couple as we neared Wylfa Head and they took advantage of a brief shortcut to head for a rare piece of woodland. Adrian wanted to walk up to the top of the Head so he sent us on without him and we soon reached a parking lot where the way forward was a little hard to determine. A westward path looked like it has once carried a coast path seal but this had been pried out and, when Adrian rejoined us, we decided to use the parking lot access road to head south, arriving soon enough at the entrance to the power plant on the main highway.

The guidebook had warned us that there might be some re-routing here (they are evidently re-commissioning the plant) and I soon spotted, beyond some temporary buildings for the workers, a finger post pointing west.

There were signs warning us not the walk on the roadway because on hurtling lorries and a fenced alternative was provided for walkers at roadside. It was often full of puddles and I wanted to take my chances on the drier road. There were no lorries.

Gradients were not too severe and we managed a useful pace through a number of kissing gates and through a wood near Cestyll. A ruined mill provided a good backdrop for one of the daily phone photos of myself – one I could send to Linda, who was looking after the dog, and then to Gavan, with whom I would walk in August. The experience also provided we with the usual opportunity to pass on some photo lore – when you are taking a picture of a standing subject try to include the feet.

Skies were brightening as we followed the coastline and descended to the inlet of Cemlyn Bay. Here a long causeway separated a lagoon from the open water and, as predicted, we were well in advance of any problems with high tide. The crossing was unpleasant however and we crunched over shingle for some distance. The bird watching tribe were much in evidence during this crossing and a chalk board at the end listed all the species that had been spotted recently. I overheard two women at this point as one said, “Everyone seemed really excited by the crossbill except her!”

After clearing this area (and losing sight at last of the power station) we found a place to sit down and have the sandwiches prepared for us by the kitchen staff at the Woburn Hill Hotel. Then in the bright sun we continued our westward journey hugging the coast with its ever-changing splendid scenery and rising and falling as we neared the inlet of Hen Borth – a tiny church below us on the left.

It was at this point that I had noted the possibility of bypassing the huge headland at Anglesey’s northwest corner by seeking a shorter road route inland. The shortcut would require some cross-country route-finding first and so we headed in a southwesterly direction along a streambed. At the end of this passage there was a public footpath sign pointing, it would seem, at a cottage’s front door but we soon found a way around this and crested a low hill with the encouraging sight of Mynachdy Farm in the distance. (The guidebook had warned that some of the headland route is closed part of the year and after completing most of this much longer option you have to retreat to the farm anyway.)

Heading toward us on a farm road was a party of geriatric walkers, all men, and some of them warned us that the mud of the farmyard would put an end to our clean boots. As we neared the farm Adrian made a small mistake. We were looking for a road that would take us in a southerly direction from the farm but the track we followed was not it and after ten minutes we had to retreat to the mud of the farmyard where our escape tarmac was at last located.

The road in question would take us to Church Bay but it did require a lot of steep uphill  – but we were certain that the coastal footpath would be a journey of unhappy rise and fall and so we persevered in our road journey. There was no traffic and the pleasures of an agricultural countryside were rewarding. At the top of a hill a farmer (who had bought his lad a splendid toy tractor) offered to give us a ride to Church Bay as we rested across the street – but we declined. He said it was downhill all the way and so it was, often steeply so.

Near the bottom we passed a splendid church and had the disappointment of discovering that the nearby pub was closed for the afternoon. So was the beach café, which we reached at 4:00 after an eleven-mile day. There was a taxi from our firm, BWJ, just leaving with another walking couple but he promised to alert the firm that we were also ready to return to Cemaes. In about twenty minutes we were speeding back to our hotel after a most satisfying, if tiring, first day.

We made arrangements for the next day’s pick up and wandered down to the Stag again. I wanted to photo two bar signs for Gavan, one with the legend “Soup of the Day: Guinness” and one stating “When Life Gives You Lemons Reach For the Tequilla.” He loved this photo. Once again we dined at our hotel and once again we enjoyed an early night.

If you want to continue from Church Bay you need:

Day 16: Church Bay to Llanfachraeth

This would also be our last stage on the Isle of Anglesey Coastal Path.