A visit to Llangrannog

 'Where shall we go today?' 

We'd met a couple of women, one a poet, in the car park in New Quay the evening before, and they'd recommended visiting Llangrannog, where they lived, so that's where we went. 

First stop, homage to a Victorian poet whose work neither of us have read because she wrote in Welsh, Sarah Jane Rees, whose bardic name was Cranogwen, and who sounds really interesting, having gone to sea as a child with her father, later setting up her own navigation school. She also edited a Welsh language women's magazine for bluestockings and proto-Suffragettes, lectured in America, and lived openly, it appears, with successive female partners, whilst still being a staunch Methodist and founder of the South Wales Women's Temperance Union. Her grave is in the churchyard of St Carranog's Church and, pleasingly, is entirely in Welsh.  

(Incidentally, St Carranog, or Carantoc, is the same saint who sailed across the Bristol Channel in a coracle, landing at Carhampton on the Somerset coast, where he tamed a dragon at the behest of King Arthur and made an appearance in a sequence of poems in my collection, Map Reading for Beginners.)  

Sarah Jane Rees is also commemorated in the village with a very newly unveiled and extremely impressive statue by Sebastien Boyson, who also sculpted the statue of the miner at the Six Bells memorial. 

After lunch on the front, we went down onto the beach ... 

... and past the rock called Carreg Bica, which, according to legend, was the giant Bica's tooth, spat out when he had a spell of toothache.

I think it looks more like an angel from behind. 

From the neighbouring cove, we climbed the steep steps up the cliff to the coast path. 

stonecrop and slate

Our plan was to walk to the end of the Ynys Lochtyn headland, where there's a colony of seals, but it was very hot and we both had spells of feeling slightly giddy, so we didn't descend to the headland, but looked down on it instead from the heights of the cliff path ... 

... before turning around and walking back to Llangrannog via a path set rather more inland than the outgoing route along the edge of the cliff. 

It wasn't the end of the world not seeing seals, not least since we had Cwtch with us who could have disturbed them, and anyhow, we'd seen some back in 2016, further down the coast at Strumble Head ... 

... and our consolation prize was a pair of choughs, seeing off some gulls from their nesting area. 

New Quay, Allt Penrhiwgaled, Cei Bach ... and Llareggub

What with losing our caravan and our Arts Council funding, which meant losing a job and retraining over a couple of years, which then stretched to three owing to a worldwide pandemic, plus the worldwide pandemic itself, we hadn't been on holiday since 2017 - that is, until this last week, which we spent in an 18th century coach house on a farm just outside New Quay in Ceredigion.

There are steps to one side of the building which suggest the upper floor, now a bedroom and bathroom, was once a hayloft or similar.

dovecote

And very picturesque it all was too, even if the anchors were a bit unexpected and reminded me of when Luke Jerram parked several fishing smacks in Leigh Woods, high above the Avon Gorge in Bristol. 

New Quay being our nearest town, we visited a couple of times, the first being the evening of our arrival, when it felt very crowded, not least because the tide was in and there was no beach to soak up the overflow of people. 

'Fair Winds and Following Seas', a 2019 sculpture by David Appleyard, with an accompanying poem by Samantha Wynne-Rhydderch

Since the Northerner's must-see of the holiday was the bottlenose dolphins in the bay, it was rather gratifying to be able to cross them off our list straight away - though, of course, they might have been porpoises, who can tell from a long distance?

Another day we walked down from the farm through the woods above the little river Gido to the coast, emerging just before Cei Bach, at the north end of the bay.

It was a very pleasant wander along the beach to New Quay, with a scramble over rocks just before we get there, the tide not being quite low enough to have uncovered a route over sand all the way. 

washed-up compass (dial) and blue jellyfishes

Both Cei Bach and New Quay have strong connections with Dylan Thomas, with New Quay joining Laugharne in staking a claim to be the inspiration for Llareggub in 'Under Milkwood'. I have to admit, we didn't follow New Quay's Dylan Thomas trail, as the waymarks seemed to be mostly of the 'this closed restaurant that is now under renovation used to be the post office where Dylan Thomas posted his scripts to London' variety, while the bungalow he stayed in has been pulled down and the pub he drank at is closed. Apologies to New Quay but it's rather less resonant than the Boathouse, the writing room, Brown's Hotel and Dylan's modest grave marker in Laugharne. Not that I'm qualified to join any scholarly argument, apart from to say Llareggub must surely be located primarily in Dylan's imagination. 

A pint at the shifting sea  

Pentre Ifan, Nevern's Bleeding Yew and Seal-Spotting at Strumble Head

As we drove through Cardigan, I slowed the windscreen wipers from fast to medium speed. 'Phew!' we agreed, 'it's going to be a scorcher.' 

We had lunch in a pub in St Dogmaels and headed for Poppit Sands, a popular suggestion amongst friends for places to visit. 

Ted in particular appreciated this choice. 

We then headed inland towards the Preseli Hills, which I would have loved to have walked, had we had more time. 

We were headed for Pentre Ifan burial chamber, a fine example of a neolithic dolmen with a 16 tonne capstone.   

My go-to dolmen is Spinsters' Rock, west of Drewsteignton on Dartmoor. Pentre Ifan is bigger, higher, stonier, with views over the Nevern valley down to Cardigan Bay. 

What I'll remember always is the energy of the stones, familiar from Stonehenge yet so unknowable, and the strong, seductive scent of late may blossom.

Our next stop, another recommendation, was the Church of St Brynach in the village of Nevern.   

St Brynach's has several claims to fame, not least its impressive, 13' Celtic cross which dates from the tenth century.  

Even older is the Vitalianus stone, which is carved with the Latin words VITALIANI EMERTO and Vitaliani in Ogham. It's believed to date from the fifth century. 

There are more old stones inside the church, set into the window sills in the south transept. This is the early tenth century Braided Cross ... 

... and this is the fifth century Maglocunus stone, inscribed MAGLOCUNI FILI CLUTORI in Latin and maglicunas maqi clutar in Ogham.

I love old churches because of what they can tell you about the lives of the people who built them and worshipped there. Sometimes, though, the mysteries simply deepen.

Increasingly, I find the sacred in nature rather than in church. Show me the fruit and I'll eat it. 

Which might be why I liked Nevern's famous bleeding yew best of all. 

NOT THAT I ATE ITS FRUIT ...

... just daubed myself with its sap. 

A quick drink in Fishguard and we drove out to Strumble Head, having been assured it was the wildest part of this coast. (I like wild.) I was hoping to spot choughs but the corvids available were resolutely jackdawian. 

I had to keep reminding myself that we weren't in Cornwall. Geographically, geologically, it seemed so familiar and yet I'd never been here before. 

We followed a path to the edge of the cliff ... 

... and in the small cove below us ... 

... were two grey seals, enjoying the last of the evening.

It was a privilege to share it with them for a time.