Is This The Most Beautiful Train Journey In Wales? | Van Life Wales 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

We're Hannah and Carl, and we're on a mission to drive around the entire coast of Wales in our pre-converted campervan, along with our dog Harper. And after spending a few days catching up with family and friends at Shell Island, today we're getting back on the road and continuing along the Welsh coast towards a very exciting activity that we've got planned in a few days' time. Do you need any help? Do you require any help? Couldn't, of course, leave Shell Island behind before taking one last walk on the beach. You're not there, are you? I love that you're doing it in your sliders. Carl and Emma did come down to this beach without me yesterday. Or was it the day before? Yesterday or the day before? And Carl's verdict was that the beach that we went to at Harlech was much better than this one. So I'm really, really intrigued to see what it's like. Oh, that's not what I thought I was going to say. That is not what I was expecting either. Warning, natureist swimming or sunbathing is permitted beyond this point. We've got a bit of a no-man's land. Here, you may or may not be allowed to be naked. But here you are allowed to be naked. There you're not allowed to be naked. Given that today is quite cold and not the same as it was yesterday. I think it was about 20 degrees yesterday, which was beautiful. I don't think there's going to be many naturists on the beach behind us. But we do need to get back to the van and fill everything and empty everything before we leave. So we're going to start heading back. Oh! You might want to stand back. I've got a water tap and a sprinkler all in one there. Squishy. I did notice. I think the problem with having this in the middle of the field. Wonderful if you're camping here. Obviously, everyone's got to bring their vans on here to fill them up. Excellent start. Is that it? Disposal area. Yeah, I think we're all waiting for the same thing. You're waiting, aren't you? Not in a rush, honestly. Unless you're going to kick us out. You might be. It's Crime Stoppers, don't worry. Well, that is nasty. Well, there's a van life top tip for you. One, don't empty the grey waste in your flip flops or your sliders. And two, make sure that you keep them on your feet when you're doing it. Don't need the nice lady to guide you out, no? Thank you. I'd love to say that we always have a plan when we leave a park up or a campsite. But that's not always the case. And in this instance, we decided to just head back to somewhere familiar and chill out for the rest of the afternoon. If the parking spot that we're parked in this morning looks familiar, it's probably because it is. We didn't really feel like doing very much when we left Shell Island yesterday and the car didn't really feel like driving very far. So we decided to come back to the car parking spot that we stayed in last time we were in Harlet because it was only about 12 minutes down the road. So this is where we woke up this morning and it's where we've been hanging out. I don't think we've actually got much of a plan for today. We usually wake up with something in mind, but that just hasn't been the case. So yeah, not quite sure what we're doing today. It's an absolutely beautiful day though, so I imagine we might end up taking somebody back to the beach. How cold do you think it's going to be? I reckon it's going to be really cold. Are you going to put your little tippy-toe in the water, are you? Yeah? Oh, that's cold. Have a feeling that that might be a little bit deeper than you think it is. Maybe send Harper out first, see if she can check it. This bit suddenly got a lot colder than the rest of the other bits. But Harper's had a great time though. Oh, she's swimming! How has this bit got 20 minutes? I know you're officially a year older now, but I'm not sure that the high-waisted trousers is for you. See those three little red bits in front of me? Yeah. The top one, just to my left of it. It's not that big a bunch. There. Yeah, where Harper's stood. I want to see if we can find a local crabby crab. Yeah? A pyramid crabby crab. Give it a go. I'm not sure if Harper's helping you or whether she's a hindrance. Oh, I missed it! Did you fall in? Well, you didn't fall in, you went for a little slip, are you okay? Yeah, careful what rock you stand on. Oh, okay. You made it? Made it. Oh, we found one! Where's he gone? Oh, he's there! He was coming out, and then he ran off. Isn't it Mr. Crab? We probably frightened him. I thought we saw a crab. Thank you, Mr. Crab. Clearly done a very poor job of packing up today, because we can hear the kettle clinking around. Oh, there we go. Right, shall we try again? Let's go get some food for our van. So Carl has spent the past 20 minutes, half an hour, whilst we've been back in the van. A little bit longer. Longer than necessary. Yeah, longer than necessary trying to find either a Lidl or an Asda here in Harlech, or sort of in the surrounding area. And the only big supermarkets that we can find are all the way up near Portmerion, which, I don't know, I just find that really, really surprising. Surely everybody here must do a food shop somewhere. So I don't know if it's just because we haven't got any, you know, we haven't got very good signal, or we're not looking in the right place. But yeah, we're driving about 20 minutes sort of back on ourselves to go to the supermarket. Hello Lidl. I'm not quite sure what happened to the rest of our footage here, but after running a few more errands, we headed off to find a new park up for the night. We have woken up to completely different weather today than we had yesterday. It is really, really grey and really cloudy, which is such a shame really, because the activity that we've got planned for later is all about the beautiful views. So yeah, I don't know if I'm quite going to get the experience that we were hoping for, but I have checked the weather forecast and it does say that it's not going to rain, which I'm really, really hoping is true. So I think we're going to get really, really wet otherwise. Anyway, Carl's has pulled off an absolute blinder with the parking spot that he chose last night. Not only is it absolutely beautiful, it's got this gorgeous little grassy sort of park I think it is that I've been walking Harper at this morning. It's also completely free, which is always a bonus. And it is literally about a two minute walk from the railway station for the Festiniog, I think that's correct, the Festiniog and Welsh Highlands Railway. I have of course booked a train for later, but it's not until ten to three, so I've got a little bit of time to kill. So I'm just quickly walking Harper and then we're going to go for a little lick of the lawn, a little wander around and sort of see what we can see. I don't think I've ever had to cross some narrow gauge railway tracks to get back to the van before. We've found Dixie. Is it Dixie the Dragon? Dixie the Dragon was made by Britain's youngest blacksmiths, Olly and Harvey Roberts, with their grandad Tony Roberts. Dixie is dedicated to wrecks from FC legend Dixie McNeill. That is really cool, could you have made that as a teenager? No! Isn't it amazing what some people can do? Do you know what I find really cool? What? Look in the mouth. Must be a jet. Does it shoot fire? Look at the bum. There's some black hoses coming out of it, so I believe it might do. That's amazing. Or at least it did at the end. What I like about this is it reminds me of almost every small port town, like Little Fishing Village. Very charming. Yeah, the way that the houses have been built, like where they've been built. Sort of around the harbour. All it's missing is a chippy. I'm sure there is a chippy somewhere. I don't think I've seen that before, there's a no horses sign. I wonder why it's no horses. No horses, no cycling, no motorbikes. These logs are under control. Harper, are you under control? Are you in control? I think that one might be a bit narrow for her to sit on. What's it like? Good view? That's a good view. I was just saying that this was a really weird place to put a bench, but I think the reason that it's here is because you get to look at that. Isn't that beautiful? It's not as beautiful as you. I'm assuming that you weren't saying that to me. I was saying that to you. Precious girl. Yeah. Perfect, perfect girl. I find it really sad that the UK makes it so difficult for vanlifers to travel around and park up and stay for a night. When the UK has got some really beautiful spots. These steps are really, really steep and they're really uneven as well, like they're worn in different places. Different heights, different depths. I feel like I'm walking into a secret garden. Whilst we were sat on the little bench up there, we saw some people walking along a little beach and some little rocks, which we're not quite sure how to get to, but I think this staircase takes you down there. It's really, really cool. It's almost like a secret little hidden cove or little hidden beach, isn't it? Little pirate cove. Yeah, I love it. Oh, wow. The stairs get even weirder. Hold on. Wow. I'm going to assume at high tide this beach isn't warm. Yeah. Oh, it goes all the way around. How amazing is this? It feels like a little snuggler's cove. There's all these little nooks and crannies in the side. What if we could find some rum? It does look like this beach goes on for absolutely ages. And there is like a little white house right at the bottom, which we think might be a cafe. And if we had a little bit more time, we would definitely keep walking and sort of get down there and see what it is. But we've got a train to catch. You made fun of me for putting my walking boots on. No, I questioned you. I didn't make fun of you. I was just questioning why you put them on. Well, this is why I put them on. If you could have told me that we were coming to the beach. I didn't know we were coming to the beach. Clearly you didn't. For a moment then, I thought that was part of a railway track. I thought the train came down here next to them. That would be really cool. Straight into the water. I definitely think that this is one of the most beautiful accidental walks we've ever ended up on. We've got the beach just down at the other side, which is obviously where we've just been. But the path itself on the way back is also just absolutely stunning. Loads of really beautiful houses, which I guess is what you'd expect from where we are. There's also lots of little bluebells and wildflowers and loads of just greenery and foliage, and there's no rubbish whatsoever. Karl did see a sign that said that residents clear up here. The residents look after this area. Yeah, which is kind of nice, isn't it? Just to know that the community care about where they are. Yeah, it's lovely, and I think it shows. It shows because there's no rubbish here, and the whole environment is just absolutely beautiful. I think we're in for the guest. Yeah. We're going to have to come back. Yeah? Yeah. I think that is possibly the quickest pit stop that we've ever had in the van. We didn't quite realise what time it is, but we've had a quick coffee and had a quick sandwich, and now we're going to find a train. What's really exciting is I think I can see the train over there. That's going to be our train. We've seen loads and loads of trains while we've been walking today. I'm so excited. There's just something really, really nostalgic about getting a little steam train, I think. Did you ever read The Railway Children? Yes. That'll probably be why. I think that's what it is. I don't think Harper's actually ever been on a train before, though. She's been on a little tram. She went on with a little tram going up to the Great Orm, didn't she? Yeah. And she did amazingly. A lot better than I thought she was going to do, so I'm hoping she's going to be okay. The only thing I'm a little bit nervous about is the steam train, and I'm not sure that she's going to like the noise, but, yeah, we'll have to see when we get there. We're going on a train. I'm a steam train. I was about to say, let's maybe not get her too excited before we get on the train. The news is that we don't really have very far to walk. We did see the train station. Yeah. We did see the train station on our way up to the coastal walk that we've just been on, and it's literally just around the corner. So we do actually know where we're going today, which is not usually the case at all. Oh, look! I was hoping for this one, I thought it would be. We're based in a compartment. I was thinking a carriage. Not a... Oh, like a full carriage. Oh, look at this. So we've had Gloucester and Manchester. Yeah. Oh, this is fantastic. I overheard that guy saying that whilst he hasn't personally counted, he's been informed that there's at least a thousand volunteers. Wow, really? It's quite impressive. That is impressive. I presume, is that like working on the trains or... I'm going to assume it's every aspect. ...in the station. Oh, I see steam. I think we might be going soon. I think that's the third time she's locked us in. We're not getting out. There are several routes you can take on the Welsh Highland Railway, but we chose the Woodland Wanderer route, which took us from Port Maddox to Tannybush, and after a very scenic seven-mile journey, we arrived at Tannybush station, where we had the opportunity to leave the train and explore the area. Here we are. Leave again at twenty-five past four. Twenty-five past four. We'll be back with us by about twenty past, and the train will be in the other platform. Brilliant. Thank you. It's thirty minutes. It's a station link walk. Blue walk. Yes, we've got the blue one, or the red one. The red one says thirty to forty-five minutes. We'll go with the blue walk. Have they changed their mind? Is that not what it said on the sign? That is not what it said on the sign. We'll see. We'll see how far we get. A walk can't be that quick. Is this it? Maybe we need to go back up those stairs there. Unless we've missed a bit. This side there? Yeah. Down to here. Is that it? It goes back on itself. And then it goes back. I think we'll go back up there then. And go up the red one. How does that take three quarters of an hour? It took us eight minutes. Oh well, we'll get back and we'll have time for a cake then, won't we? Go on, Abra. That way. What's erm... Footsteps. Like a big footstep. A little footstep. And a tiny baby one. I think we've come up to do a Celtic folk story. Quite possibly. Unsurprisingly, I think we've taken a little bit of a wrong turn. So we're just er... I think we're going to go all the way back down to the bottom and then try and go up the other route that we can see on the other side of the river. I think that actually takes us back up to the station. There's a little otter. I think that's an otter. Like carved into the tree. It's so beautiful. Yeah, it shouldn't have got much tinier. I know. I think that might be Carl's very polite way of saying hurry the **** up and stop taking so many videos. Well, there you go. You can go on a beautiful walk after you've gotten off the train. Where you will end up? Anybody's guess. But very, very beautiful. Thank you so much. You're very welcome. Thank you. Imagine staying at this prem you're in here and you're just staying in one of those rooms and you get to see all the little trains going past. Look, there's people having their dinner. Watching the train. There we are. Thank you so much. Thank you. We obviously had one other very, very important thing that we needed to do today and we said that we'd do it when we got back from our walk and before we went on the train, but we just didn't have time. Obviously that thing to do was to go and get gas but neither of us can be bothered to do that now and Carl has made an absolutely excellent suggestion in that we go and see if there's any fish and chips. Yay! Whilst we love cooking in Cindy and the much bigger kitchen was one of the reasons that we chose her in the first place there's nothing quite like eating fish and chips outside in the sunshine with a beautiful view. As always, thanks for watching and please don't forget to like and subscribe and leave a comment below if you've enjoyed this video.