Visiting Southwestern Wales from Ireland

If you are taking a trip to Ireland, you may be considering a visit to Wales as well. Southwestern Wales and Pembrokeshire are gorgeous, and definitely worth taking the additional time. Often visitors ask whether there is a Dublin to Wales ferry. Not directly! You’ll first take a train to Rosslare.

As with its namesake garment, the town of Cardigan in the Pembrokeshire region of southwestern Wales, proved to be immensely comfortable, relaxed, and casual. Yet it offers enough diversity of attractions, scenery, history, food, crafts, and downtime to make it an ideal destination for an engaging yet restful getaway.

Taking the Ferry, Ireland to Wales

An easy ferry ride from Ireland, the southwestern corner of Wales makes for a lovely trip extension for travelers going to or coming from Ireland. 

If you want to take a ferry from Dublin to Wales, you’ll first take a three-hour train ride from Dublin to the ferry port in Rosslare. Then the crossing to Fishguard in Wales is a further three hours on a very comfortable, well-appointed ferry (with dining, movies, shopping, and a bar) that offers year-round service.

Our taxi from Fishguard to the car hire (rental) office in nearby Haverford West was our first introduction to the stunning Welsh countryside, and acquainted us with the friendly, chatty nature of the Welsh people.  Rental car acquired, we struck out north for the coast and Cardigan.

Even for an Irishman (albeit a new one), Wales is stunning.  The lush rolling green hills of Pembrokeshire give way to dense green forests (unlike Ireland), and gently taper down to shallow bays, tide pools and craggy cliffs along the edge of the sea.

St. Dogmaels and Cardigan

Just outside Cardigan sits the quaint village of St. Dogmaels (“St. Dogs” to the locals).  It was here, on a drizzly Tuesday, that we walked through the weekly St. Dogmaels Producers Market. This farmers market with 20-30 stalls offers regional produce, crafts, and artisanal cheeses, preserves, breads, and a selection of snacks and hand pies, etc.

The friendly, chatty purveyors made us feel instantly welcome, and amongst foodie friends.  The market sits on a tiny street with ample public parking in a lot just a block or two distant.  While it is somewhat small, the St. Dogmaels Producers Market is an excellent anchor point for a morning’s historic exploration of the village.  It’s conveniently situated between two picturesque and fascinating historic sites.

On a low hill overlooking the St. Dogs Producers Market sits the ruins of St. Dogmaels Abbey, founded in the early 12th century.  Today, only a scattering of walls and crumbling foundation remain. But after brief wander amongst the ruins, in the Coach House cafe and museum (next to the farmers market), visitors can read about the abbey’s tumultuous past.  And for those who aren’t superstitious or easily scared, each summer (since 1987) the Abbey Shakespeare Players stage nighttime performances in the old abbey.  Imagine the feeling as the lights fall, a thin mist floats across the ground, and then, suddenly, the damp stone walls echo with the words of the Bard.

Across the street from the Producers Market,  the Coach House, and the abbey, a small, nondescript looking pond is the first hint that an old mill sits nearby. 

Set in the very heart of St. Dogmaels, Y Felin mill has had numerous local owners since it opened in 1640.  The current owners have been faithfully and painstakingly restoring the old mill since 1980, and continue to maintain a regular milling schedule. 

Throughout the day, the miller’s daughter conducts a very thorough tour. It begins at the top of the mill (up two flights of steep and narrow stairs), covers the entire milling process and the history of the mill, and ends below the pond, out alongside the spillway and the massive wheel.  For those with room in their luggage, sacks of the mill’s flour can also be purchased.   If it’s the off season, or not a market day, it pays to drop by in advance, or call ahead to confirm tour times and reserve a spot.

After touring the mill, we followed a tip from one of the locals and headed out along the river road to the Ferry Inn, a local favorite restaurant offering excellent seafood served on a deck overlooking the scenic estuary of the Afon Teifi (River Teifi). 

Then, back in the village, we took the old stone bridge on Castle Street across the river and into Cardigan proper.

With its strategic position along the river and near the coast, Cardigan was originally established in 1110 as a trading center for both land-based and coastal trade.  Today, Cardigan is a sedate tourist enclave filled with loads of shops, galleries, and Cardigan Castle.  If you’re in the mood for pizza and something a bit different, Pizzatipi offers cracker thin crusts, fresh ingredients, and Pembrokeshire craft beer underneath two massive tipis warmed by open fire pits.  The food is just okay, but the atmosphere is uniquely infectious and, set out on the old riverside stone docks, it’s hard not to feel drawn back to the days of yore.

Cenarth

Coming from Ireland, which is notably devoid of forests, we relished the idea of staying in the wooded natural beauty of southwestern Wales, and jumped at the chance to stay with friends in the tiny village of Cenarth about 30 minutes east of Cardigan, and upstream on the River Teifi.  For me, the other draws to Cenarth were boats and cheese.

National Coracle Centre

Just across Cenarth Bridge and Cenarth Falls sits the National Coracle Centre, a tiny gem of a museum that doesn’t just tell the history of these minuscule fishing boats.  It also documents the use and development of this style of boat throughout the world.  Essentially a woven basket with an outer skin and a seat, coracles (called currachs in Ireland) are used for fishing, very limited cargo, and human transport on inland waterways (rivers and lakes). 

The same style of small, relatively easy to build and maintain boat can be found in native cultures around the world, many of which are documented in the Cenarth museum.  In fact, the very river landing where my wife and I rode a coracle in India is immortalized in a display on the walls of the museum. 

In addition to photos and written exhibits, the museum includes many actual coracles, including one that visitors are encouraged to try paddling and carrying (coracles are designed to be transported to the water’s edge on the paddler’s back).  The museum manager is quite pleasant and does a terrific job of describing the unique paddling technique used by coracle fishermen.  He also pointed us to the other attraction included with our ticket to the National Coracle Centre.

Behind the National Coracle Centre museum, through the gate, a few hundred feet along an overgrown riverside trail, sits an old disused mill with most of its original machinery still intact.  And, just as the coracle museum tells us about traditional watercraft, the long-abandoned mill offers a close up view of the ingenuity of early milling technology.

SPECIAL TREAT – Kendal Mint Cake

And, as an aside, in the National Coracle Centre gift shop, I purchased my first packet of Kendal Mint Cake, a sweet and refreshing snack for hikers and the like that is famous for having been taken up Everest by Sir Edmund Hillary.  This treat is so intensely minty that the open bar lasted both of us for about four days, and was just as refreshing at the end as they day I bought it and my world changed. But, fear not, you don’t have to go to rural Wales to get it (though you should anyways), Kendal Mint Cake is available throughout the U.K.

Continuing our food adventures, we rambled about 20 minutes, by twisty back road, from the National Coracle Centre in “downtown” Cenarth, to Caws Cenarth, an artisanal cheesery, with a small museum that explains the cheesemaking process and the history of Caws Cenarth. Having tried their products at the St. Dogmaels Producers Market, and heard good things about their shop, we were anxious to step into their sampling parlor.  With about a dozen different varieties, we were happy to  buy a few rounds of Caws Cenarth’s best to take home.  Cheese lovers can choose from pre-assembled four-packs of the cheesemaker’s top sellers, or, as we did, can put together their own assortment from among their favorites on the tasting flight.

Around Pembrokeshire and Southwestern Wales

Always on the lookout for unusual “doing” opportunities, and wanting to encourage farm-to-table projects and local sourcing, while in Cenarth we took the opportunity to travel further afield, finding excellent options in both Newcastle and Narberth.

In Newcastle, about 20 minutes further east from Cenarth, Yasmin’s is an Indian restaurant which specializes in local sourcing and sustainability.  The restaurant grows its own produce in a giant polytunnel behind the restaurant, and on a nearby farm operated by the restaurant.  In the future, they plan to buy their own boat and offer locally sourced seafood.  But Yasmin’s efforts are not just a novelty, their hard work and commitment carry through to the plate.  The food is excellent and the service attentive and friendly.

For something even more unexpected in the Welsh hinterlands, we drove about an hour from Cenarth (stopping on the way to admire the view), to the touristy shopping enclave of Narberth. 

Here, amidst loads of quaint galleries, shops, and more traditional restaurants, we discovered Tooj Cafe, a colorful restaurant serving homemade, traditional Kurdish dishes.  With the Kurdish equivalent of mezzes on offer along with mains and dessert, tea, coffee, and a delightfully refreshing and lightly alcoholic lemonade, Tooj got my vote for the trip’s biggest surprise and most relaxing dining experience. 

For me, the combination of stunning natural beauty, history, good food, traditional boatbuilding, and some of the most genuinely friendly and engaging people I’ve met, marked southwestern Wales as a place that should be on everyone’s “gift to myself” list of travel destinations. If you are planning a trip to Ireland, consider tacking on an few extra days and make the journey to Wales. You’ll be glad you did.

Glenn Kaufmann is a freelance travel, food, and film journalist based in Dublin, Ireland.  As a child of the American South, he has a weakness for buttermilk biscuits.  As an escapee from Los Angeles, he has a love for seeing beaches and deserts in the same day. And, now, in Ireland, he’s developed a fondness for whiskey (and a collection to match).

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