ACTION-PAC
The Welsh island is a still a family favourite, says Vincent Graff
MAnY years ago — aged 13 — I came to north Wales on a mountain-climbing trip and nearly died. My teacher lost a small group of us near the top of a foggy peak on Snowdonia and we had to be guided down by a stranger. Three decades on, I’m back, now with my wife and family. We’re on the island of Anglesey, overlooking the mainland. So, what greets me in the distance when I open the curtains on our first morning? Those same scary mountains.
This time, though, they fill me with joy. It’s a bright, sunny day and the Menai Strait, the thin band of water that separates this small island from ‘ proper’ Wales, i s sparkling l i ke a Seventies’ disco glitter ball.
It’s a blissful scene. Long shadows, tiny fluffs of clouds, the sound of seagulls.
We’re staying two nights at the Chateau Rhianfa, built 165 years ago as a dower house by an eccentric local baronet to mimic a Loire Valley chateau. Its baroque arches and turrets look mighty peculiar plonked on the Welsh coast.
The house is laid out as if a grand family still lives there. Dinner is served in a woodpanelled banqueting hall and there’s the sweet smell of wood smoke wherever you go.
My wife and I wallow in the peace of the place. But is there anything to keep our young children occupied? Absolutely.
We head to Anglesey Sea Zoo, a slightly silly name for a very good aquarium.
The children, George and Daisy, are amused by tales of spiny lobsters that crawl for thousands of miles nose to tail with hundreds of their chums along the seabed from Wales to the Mediterranean. I’m intrigued by the idea that bream can change their sex if they need to.
Outside, there’s an inflatable slide, crazy golf and ice cream. We spend the day there before going for a plate of local mussels at Dylan’s Restaurant in Menai.
The next day we aim f or Beaumaris Castle, ten minutes from the hotel. Built by Edward I in the 13th century, it’s an impressive ruin with a pretty moat. But it’s not shown off to its best advantage. My lot want to know what it was like to live there when it was a military command centre. So do I.
Where did the warriors eat their rations (and what did they eat)? Where did they sleep? What weapons did they have?
We leave a little disappointed and then, by accident, stumble across two brilliant places: the town’s 400-year-old courthouse and a sinister Victorian prison, which are no longer in use and have been opened to the public.
Talk about ‘access all areas’ — nothing i s behind Perspex. You’re encouraged to walk where you l i ke, touch what you want.
We read the graffiti the prisoners carved into the floor and lie on prison issue hammocks.
The good news: if you were