Porthmadog to Llangefni

Today’s ride on Komoot

Outside my window was the old train station and the platform was scattered with enthusiasts waiting for the train to arrive. It duly arrived and cameras and tripods came out. I admit it looked impressive for a bit of a toy train.

I packed and left the hotel and took some train photos like everyone else in town, then left. Porthmadog is nice but not that nice. In fact everything I like about the place isn’t the town itself. The water, the hills, the harbour and colours are beautiful.

Leaving the town felt like it was all uphill. I’m definitely tired, even though I’ve had two rest days this week. I think I’ve reached peak Wales. It’s absolutely beautiful and continues to be. I’d also say it’s one of the nicest places that I’ve ever ridden. I’m just tired of the continual uphill and downhill there’s just no rest or relaxation on a ride. Fifty kms here feels like more than 80 in Holland 😁

So leaving Porthmadog reinforced those feelings. I felt like the climbing was for no reason as I immediately went down the valley only to ride up the other side.

Having said that, the 10kms into Caernarfon were on a bike path and nearly all downhill, so, yes, I did relax.

I got to Caernarfon and saw the train from earlier in the day. It’s obviously not really a toy train after all. In Caernarfon, the castle was impressive and I stopped for some lunch in town. It was windy, coming in from the sea, and starting to get cold. When I left, I took a long time to warm up.

It was bumpy bike paths for a lot of the way towards Bangor, but I was really happy that I didn’t have to negotiate the Saturday afternoon traffic. I crossed the lovely Menai bridge to the Isle of Anglesey and thought I’d look for a place to stay.

Every place I looked at or called, was either too expensive or fully booked. One place kindly suggested A pub not far from them. I couldn’t understand the name so I asked them to spell it. I still didn’t understand it but used the letters I heard to google it. It took about ten minutes of searching to find. 

It wasn’t cheap, but it was in the perfect spot and would leave me with a simple ride to the ferry at Holyhead in the morning. There were a few ups and downs along the way, but nothing of the scale of mainland Wales.

I stopped in the town of Llangefni for some snacks and while most people were friendly, there were some angry people about. The pub is a few kilometres out of the town and is really nice.

I was unsurprisingly tired after cleaning up and eating. Wales has exhausted me. I had to plan tomorrow’s ferry and some Dublin accommodation which isn’t easy with a bike. For some reason, Irish Ferries only allow bikes on a particular type of ticket – which didn’t apply to me, and most reasonable accommodation options in Dublin were booked out or didn’t have bike storage.