2nd July 2022

Day 12

If anyone had told me a few years back that I’d be getting up at 6.30am on a Saturday morning to get to a parkrun … I’d have said you were mad!! But, somehow, on occasion now this happens and today was one of those Saturdays! No rolling out of bed to head to your local park – today involved checking out of our airbnb in Nefyn, mainland Wales, to drive back onto the island of Anglesey for the Newborough Forest parkrun. We also had a 5 mile coastal stretch that we hadn’t covered, so that was all part of the planning too!

It was a wonderful opportunity to see Newborough Forest in sunnier weather as last week’s walk through had been wet and wild. Still didn’t see any red squirrels though, so elusive! Lovely bunch of people as always and a fabulous course – highly recommend. No volunteering today, just running.

From there we drove to a fabulous cafe that we had discovered last week – The Heritage Cafe in Brynsiencyn. You must stop there if you’re in the area – the loveliest Mum and Son team ever and delicious food. And right opposite the cafe, the bus picked us up to take us to that place with the really long name ….. Llanfairpwllgwyngyll. We had walked as far as this back in 2018 so we were picking up were we’d left off.

A bit of road walking to start off but eventually we reached some farmland and then woodland areas. And along the way we met a really lovely couple – Hannah and Rory – who are walking the coastal path too. So we walked the next few miles together, exchanging tales of travelling, walking adventures and life in general. We loved having your company Hannah and Rory – got so caught up in chat that we didn’t notice the miles flash by!!

We parted ways at Brynsiencyn where we had parked the car outside the Heritage Cafe and of course it would have been rude to not go back in for more sustenance – well it had been 3 hours and five miles + of walking since breakfast. Funny story alert: I went into order while Steve used the ‘conveniences.’ While at the counter a very loud alarm started sounding …. Steve had pulled the cord thinking it was the toilet chain. We rescued him!!

And so back to mainland Wales and our new airbnb accommodation in Pwllheli – a very pretty studio by the beach. We’re here for the next 7 days and the owners Marilyn and Pete seem super friendly. We’re right on the coastal path too so I believe a few walks are planned! My only concern is a warning sign on their fence announcing that there are adders in the nearby sand dunes (and Marilyn has confirmed this). My biggest phobia! Well, I will be walking in trousers tomorrow and they’ll be tucked into my socks – I don’t care what I look like!!