Penmaenuchaf Hall

by Alan Cole · Monday, July 15th, 2024

Our 20th-anniversary celebrations continued at the weekend with a mini-break at Penamenuchaf Hall. It’s not far away from us but we hadn’t been there before so it was the ideal place for a little treat and a night away. We left just after lunch on Friday and had intended to go for a stroll somewhere en route but it wasn’t the nicest of days.

Fortunately, there was a little break in the rain as we arrived so rather than go straight to the hotel we parked up at Penmaenpool and went for a little stroll past the George III pub and down onto the beach. Anna hadn’t really been here before so it was some new views for her. Although, she did cycle past it with me and Morgan once quite a few years ago. I’d been here quite a few times either in my surf ski as I paddled around the turn point whilst racing in the Mawddach Marathon or on other paddling expeditions in the Mawddach Estuary.

After our little stroll, we drove up to Penmaenuchaf Hall where we had a friendly welcome and were shown to our room. We’d been upgraded to a larger room than we had booked with a huge bed and a nice little seating area by the window. Anna had also ordered a box of chocolates that had been placed in our room for us. It was a dreary day but the views from our window out over the gardens were nice and we were looking forward to exploring once it stopped raining.

After settling in we headed down to the library for a pot of tea and to relax in the lovely surroundings of the hotel. It seemed fairly quiet but we weren’t the only ones there. We had a table booked in the restaurant for 7:15pm so managed to have a little wander around the gardens in between the showers. It was all very nice and very peaceful.

Dinner

We got changed for dinner and headed down to the restaurant. We started off with cocktails in the lounge whilst perusing the menus. The lounge was originally the billiard room but was now full of comfy sofa’s and lots of original features. Again, it was all fairly quiet. The menu comprised of either a 5 course tasting menu (7 courses if you count the appetisers and the bread course!), or an ala carte menu that had a choice of most of the things on the tasting menu but would obviously only be 3 courses and slightly larger portions.

I like to try everything. Anna is a little more particular but there was noting that put her off the tasting menu so we went for that. We then moved into the conservatory and started our little tasting menu experience. As expected the food was all delicious. Anna was a little perturbed by the fish and tomato course as the two things she dislikes most are fish and tomatoes, but she ate most of it and the few little bits she left just meant more for me!

I enjoyed all of it, and spreading it out over 7 courses just makes it last a little longer. The staff were all nice too and chatted to us not only about the food, but also about where we lived and about trips to the Outer Hebrides. After dinner we went back into the lounge for coffee and some little cherry jelly treats.

We were quite tired by now so soon headed off to bed.

Breakfast and a Trip to Fairbourne

The following morning started with a delicious breakfast in the hotel. You can’t beat a quality fry up!!

We had a relaxed morning but soon set off under grey skies towards Fairbourne. Anna hadn’t been to Fairbourne before so we drove through the village and parked up at the far end of the dunes where we had a little stroll along the beach with views over to Barmouth.

Needless to say there wasn’t much going on so we got back in the car for a pleasant drive home via Tywyn and Aberdyfi and had a chilled afternoon at home catching up with the Tour de France and Wimbledon.

All in all a nice short break and it was still only Saturday afternoon so we still had another day of the weekend to ourselves. Morgan meanwhile had started his journey from the Rocky Mountains down to the coast. He was heading first to Vancouver for a night there, then over to Vancouver Island where he would have a night in a hostel in Tofino and then would be off to a new job in a hotel on the beach. In some way, we had gone from our house in Ynyslas to a very similar part of the world just up the road. Fairbourne is almost a carbon-copy of Borth and Ynyslas. Meanwhile, halfway across the world Morgan was also heading to a little seaside town with something of a hippy-surf vibe!

Mum x says:

Monday, July 15th, 2024 at 9:13 am

Looks and sounds lovely.
Nice though that all three of you obviously love the place you live !

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