COLD WEEKEND IN LLANDUDNO: 24 hours in a Victorian holiday resort

Today I attended my union’s regional AGM in Llandudno. Not exactly thrilling, not exactly a spectator sport and not the most exotic of locations. The only thing that made it any different from any other AGM was the fact that we had a mini demonstration outside to publicise the pending strike action.

Snuggled up against the Great Orme, Llandudno is the archetypal Victorian Seaside resort, with a long beach fronted by row upon row of Victorian Hotels. As holiday destinations go it is pretty old fashioned but some how it has managed to avoid becoming an Eastbourne style retirement town and can be quite lively on times, and the Friday night had turned into 'crawl' around Llandudno's pubs.

After the meeting I went for a bit of a walk along the Victorian pier to take a few snaps, then headed south.

Visiting the Valleys you could be forgiven for thinking of Wales as being densely populated, but the reality is that once you move away from the M4 corridor, you find yourself in a mountainous rural landscape. From Merthyr to Blaina Festiniog it’s over 150 miles of mountains and the ‘trunk road’ is a windy, twisty little affair, often going through little villages that are not wide enough for heavy vehicles. Because of this, the 200-mile journey can take up to 5 hours.

Many people hate the journey, but I actually enjoy it. The scenery, especially when you get into Snowdonia is nothing short of breath taking. In the dark though it is nothing short of a nightmare so a couple of us decided to break the journey by stopping off half way and having a night in the university town of Aberystwyth.