Barkby Beach, North Wales | Photo Diary

Hey everyone! I hope you've all had a fantastic week so far. Did you know it's National Chocolate Day? So it's the perfect excuse for you to go get yourself some of your favourite chocolate treats. I've already devoured some Cadbury Dairy Milk caramel nibbles :) Today's post is my last photo diary from my recent trip to North Wales. The weather for most of the week was miserable, but it brightened up for just enough time on the last day to go to the beach. Yay! I managed to tick off some of my summer bucketlist. Enjoy! 

Me and my family stayed in the coastal town of Prestatyn, which is around a 15 minute drive away from the popular North Wales holiday town, Rhyl. We stayed at a Pontins resort, and it was great fun because I haven't been to a Pontins since I was around 10 years old. It was interesting to see how the characters from the children's entertainment had changed; I so prefer the 90's ones! Who else went to Pontins when they were kids?

There was a beach literally 5-10 minutes walk down the road called Barkby Beach and it was beautiful, surrounded by gorgeous sand dunes and with an awesome pile of huge rocks scattered with seaweed and with little pools underneath. It was a really windy day which was fantastic for flying kites so my brother was very happy! He'd brought a few kites with him, and my favourite was the big cobra one that you can see in one of my photographs. It was so colourful and it's long green and black striped body/tail looked so impressive dancing around in the sky. 

It was so relaxing to stroll down the beach, to feel the sand between my toes and to wade in the pools and streams of saltwater. I have always loved collecting shells since I was little and this beach was covered in such pretty ones, so I picked up a few to bring home with me. It was a shame that it starting raining as soon as I'd made it down to the sea, and I had to put my camera away. I also managed to stand on some soft, sinking sand and my leg got engulfed by it hahaha it was covered in some thick black stuff that looked like tar mixed with squid ink. It was gross and really hard to get off. Oh the joys of going to the the beach! 

I managed to pick up some cheap buckets and a little spade for only 50p so before we went back to our chalet for something to eat, I got to release my inner child and play in the sand. I ticked 'build a sandcastle' off my summer bucketlist, even though it was definitely not a very grand sandcastle! The tide was too far out for me to collect water to make a moat but it still had fun. I felt a little like Godzilla when I detroyed my sandcastles before we left the beach! I wish we'd had more time in Prestatyn and much nicer weather so I could have explore the sand dunes and spent more time by the ocean. I'd love to go back to this beach some day :)

Thankyou for reading!

♥

What's your favourite thing about going to the beach? Do you have any summer holiday plans this year?

 If you checked seen my other holiday photo diary posts, follow the link below:

| Rhuddlan Castle Photo Diary | Dyserth Waterfall Photo Diary |  

 

Dyserth Waterfall, North Wales | Photo Diary

Yesterday, I blogged about my visit to an awesome castle ruins on my recent holiday to the North Wales coast. After we'd explored what remained of the courtyards and rooms and towers of this gorgeous castle, we hit the road in search of some other interesting tourist sites. We drove past a sign for the Dyserth Waterfall and of course, we had to go and see it! This photo diary is all about this beautiful natural wonder. Enjoy! 

I absolutely fell in love with this waterfall! I've never seen one as big in my life :) This source says the Ffyddion river falls 70 feet to create this stunning waterfall. It was nice to see it so close to the road, we could hear it as soon as we got out of the car! By the entrance to the waterfall, there was a old kiosk style shop and cafe, but they were closed and the only way to pay the admission fee was through an honesty box in the wall. The admission was only 50p so hopefully everyone is actually paying! As soon as we entered, we discovered that the shop and cafe were closed as the owner had passed away; there was a memorial bench dedicated to him and it made me feel sad that no-one had followed in his footsteps to run the shop that looked so well kept, like it was his pride and joy. I'm hoping that someone does still run it but they just happened to not be there on the day we visited. 

There was so much nature surrounding the waterfall... trees, moss, flowers, shrubs, ferns. It was a beautiful location. There was a mini waterfall just before you to got to the main waterfall which was lovely and there were the most gorgeous roses across the other side of the Ffyddion river with benches were visitors could sit down to eat their lunch and enjoy the views. To view the huge Dyserth Waterfall, there was a bridge over the river to stand on and it was such a nice experience to stand there getting covered in the mist coming off the waterfall. On a really hot day, I'm sure it would feel fantastic :) Next to the waterfall, there were steps that lead up a hill behind the waterfall and to a woods. I didn't know this when I started the walk up though, and I seriously regretted going up there because the steps seemed to be never-ending! It was really taxing on my fibromyalgia and I ended up having deep muscle pain in my legs and sore hips for the rest of the day. My asthma was not happy either! Thankfully there was a bench at the top of the hill that I crashed on and decided to stay there until my family had finished exploring. One positive to this situation was that there were some lovely views over the countryside from on top of the hill. I'm really happy I got to see this waterfall as two years ago when I was last in North Wales, I bought a postcard called 'Waterfalls of Wales' and this one was on there so it feels special that I got to see it in person. 

Thankyou for reading! 

♥

Have you ever been to a waterfall? Is there a waterfall somewhere in the world that you dream of visiting one day? For me, it's Victoria Falls in Africa & Niagara Falls in Canada. 

 Check mysome of my other travel posts

| Rhuddlan Castle: Photo Diary | My Trip to Sweden Part 1 & Part 2 |

 

Rhuddlan Castle, North Wales | Photo Diary

Happy Monday! As many of you will know, last week I went on a little trip with my family to North Wales. We stayed in a town on the coast called Prestatyn, which is a lovley place that I also visited when I was a child so I have lots of fond memories of the area. Over the next few days, I'm going to share with you all several photo diaries of the places we visited during our holiday, and I hope you enjoy them. Today's post is all about an awesome castle ruins we visited on the third day of our trip :) 

Rhuddlan Castle is absolutely gorgeous! I was in awe as I walked around the ruins and explored up the stairs to the top of what once used to be towers. I'd just watched the Game of Thrones Season 6 finale on the morning that we set off on our trip so it was fresh in my mind and I have to admit that I couldn't stop picturing scenes from the show as I wandered around the site. I remember that when I was standing on a raised area of the castle, looking out across the beautiful Denbighshire countryside, I was imagining I was Sansa looking across the lands of her ancestors from the top of Winterfell. Yes, I'm a big GoT nerd and I am not ashamed! :) Historical sites like this one always send me into a little world of my own. I walked around imagining what each area of the castle would have looked like in it's prime, filled with people and artifacts of the time. I always get lost in my day dreaming, to the point that my family were trying to shout me to tell me they'd found a mole running around inside the grounds of the castle, but I was in a world of my own so I missed the opportunity to see the little cutie! 

Rhuddlan castle was built in 1277 by James of Saint George under King Edward the First and is now governed by Cadw, which is the historic environment service of the Welsh Government that protect and preserve historical heritage sites across the country. They host several events at the castle every year, such as the 'Festival of Archaeology'. It's an awesome piece of architecture and I'm really happy that I got the chance to visit it. Read more about the castle's history here. The lovely field of metal flowers you can see on the last photograph are part of a campaign called the 'Flower Power Appeal'. There are 1,000 of these colourful flowers on site that can be purchased to raise money for the St Kentigern Hospice, which is such a lovely idea. I wish I'd have known this when I was there as I would have bought one. I did purchase a few postcards at the gift shop in the entrance to the castle though. The admission to the castle was £3.50 each and we were given a key to gain access to the gate at the top of the main tower, so that we could stand on the top of the castle and look out over the amazing surroundings. I thoroughly enjoyed my visit to Rhuddlan Castle!

Thankyou for reading! 

I hope you all enjoyed this post! I'll have another for you up tomorrow :) 

♥

Have you ever been to Wales? Have you been to visit a castle whilst you were there?

Enjoyed this? Check out some of my other photo diary posts:

| Sunny Sunday in the Garden | An Afternoon in the Woods |