PORTMEIRION

     An Italianate village on the coast of Wales: is it possible? Portmeirion is the most charming place in the Principality. It was begun in 1925 by architect Clough Williams-Ellis, who called it "a lighthearted live exhibition of architecture, decor and landscaping." His intention was to prove that buildings could actually enhanced an already beautiful landscape. Towers, spires, turrets, domes, campaniles, triumphal arches, murals and weatherboard cottages make up this joyous fantasy, in a thickly wooded setting on the edge of a big sandy bay.

 Portmeirion, Gwynedd

 
It is familiar to many who haven't even been here from the cult T.V. series The Prisoner. Many of the cottages offer first-rate accommodations as part of the Portmeirion Hotel. One of the most elegant and unusual places to stay in Wales, this waterfront mansion is located at the heart of Portmeirion. The original part of the building is Victorian, although it was greatly expanded in the 1920s.

ANGLESEY

 Low-lying and agricultural, the island of Anglesey seems, on the first impression, rather dull in comparison with the splendid scenery on the other side of the great suspension bridge across the Menai Strait. Yet it has a beautiful coastline, a fair number of historic sights and is one of the most resolutely Welsh parts of the country. The Isle of Anglesey Coastal Path extends 125 miles around the island, with cliffs, sandy covers, and plenty of scenic variety.

Menai Straits and bridges showing Swillies

Llanfair­pwllgwyngyll­gogery­chwyrn­drobwll­llan­tysilio­gogo­goch is a village on the Menai Strait. The longest place name in Britain, known to locals just as Llanfair PG, came about as a 19th-century hoax to draw tourists, but it stuck. Isle of Anglesey is linked to the mainland by the Britannia road and rail bridge and by Thomas Telford’s remarkable chain suspension bridge, built in 1826 over the Menai Strait.

Received from Thomas, Northamptonshire