Continued from Part Four
We've reached the final chapter of our action-crammed nine-day adventure in Wales. This last segment begins with a visit to a part of the country I'd always wanted to see, the island of Anglesey, which forms the northwest corner of Wales. The place has been in the news recently because Prince William and Kate – pardon me, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge – are living there during his military service, and we did see and hear several military aircraft roaring over the area. But mostly, Anglesey feels like a very quiet corner, or at least it does in early spring, and quiet certainly characterized Beaumaris, the castle town we visited.
This old house is marked as having been built about 1400. I have to admit this is not the kind of provenance (or architecture) we come across in New York.
Beaumaris Castle has a decisive moat.
As usual in these waterside locales, seabirds sailed overhead and perched on the towers, making a lot more noise than the sheep grazing in the distance or the occasional tourist. On the other hand, keeping the grass neatly cut in the castle courtyard is a job that must keep someone busy.
The "Gunners Walk" provides a view over the channel separating Anglesey from the mainland of Wales. It also gives a glimpse of the playground-by-the-castle motif we couldn't help noticing in several places. Again, not something you typically see in the good old USA.
Nearby, the historic St Marys and St Nicholas Church contains the stone tomb of Princess Joan of Wales, daughter of England's King John and wife of Llywelyn the Great, Prince of Wales. She died in 1237.
A later web search found for me a Beaumaris Yacht Club, too, and I was surprised we had missed that – until I saw that it's in Beaumaris, Ontario, which is named after the Beaumaris in Wales. So, since no one was inviting us to a yacht party, we drove back onto the mainland and headed along the coast for a more populated resort town, Llandudno.
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