Conwy
This garrison town was built with the Conwy castle in the 1280s to give Edward I an English toehold in Wales. What's left today are the best medieval walls in Britain surrounding a humble town and crowned by the bleak and barren hulk of a castle that was awesome in its day. Conwy's charming High Street leads from Lancaster Square (with the bus stop, unmanned train station, and a column honoring the town's founder, Welsh prince Llywelyn the Great) down to a fishy harbor that permitted Edward to safely restock his castle. Since the highway was tunneled under the town, a strolling ambience has returned to Conwy.
St Mary's Parish Church from 1186 is still the core of the town and worth a look for its fine interior and wispy graveyard. Sitting lonely in the center of town, the church was the centerpiece of a Cistercian abbey that stood here a hundred years before the town. The Cistercians were French monks who built their abbeys in lonely places, "far from the haunts of man." Popular here because they were French and not English, the Cistercians taught locals farming and mussel-gathering techniques. Edward moved the monks 12 miles upstream but kept the church for his town. Notice the tombstone of a victim of the Battle of Trafalgar just left of the north transept. On the other side of the church, a tomb containing seven brothers and sisters is marked "We Are Seven." It inspired William Wordsworth to write his poem of the same name. The slate tombstones look new even though many are hundreds of years old. Pure slate weathers better than marble (cemetery always open, church may be staffed June–Aug Mon–Fri 10:00–12:00 & 14:00–16:00).
Stroll the harbor past the The Smallest House in Great Britain (72" wide, 122" high, and worth £1 to see), the Queen Victoria tour boat (£5, 30 min), the lifeboat house, and the Mussels Center, where this important local catch is processed "in the months with an r." Further on, beyond the castle, the mighty Telford suspension bridge is a 19th-century slice of English imperialism, built in 1826 to better connect (and control) the route to Ireland.
The tourist information (TI) office shares a building with the castle's ticket office and gift shop (June-Sept daily 9:30–18:00; April-May and Oct daily 9:30-17:00; Nov–March Mon-Sat 9:30-16:00; tel. 01492/592-248). The TI sells books and maps on the area. The TI also reserves rooms for a £1 fee and makes theater bookings. Don't confuse the TI with the tacky "Conwy Visitors Centre" — with its goofy little £1 video show — near the station.
Conwy Castle, built dramatically on a rock overlooking the sea with eight linebacker towers, has an interesting story to tell. Built in four years, the castle had a water gate that allowed safe entry for English boats in a land of hostile Welsh (£4.50, June–Sept daily 9:30-18:00, April–May and Oct daily 9:30–17:00, Nov–March Mon-Sat 9:30-16:00, Sun 11:00-16:00, tel. 01492/592-358). Guides wait inside to take you on a one-hour, £1 tour. If the booth is empty, look for the group and join it.
Bodnant Garden is a sumptuous 80-acre display of floral color just six miles south of Conwy. Set in the lush green of Snowdonia, this garden is one of Britain's best. It's famous for its magnolias, rhododendrons, camellias, and floral arch made of bright-yellow laburnum, which blooms mid May through early June (£7, mid-March–Oct daily 10:00–17:00, closed Nov–mid-March, café, best in spring, phone message tells what's blooming, tel. 01492/650-460).
Updated for 2008. For lots more information, check out our best-selling Rick Steves' Great Britain guidebook — or join us on one of our free-spirited Britain tours!