Cemaes - Tale of the Toilets, Bay and Church

Public Toilets are being closed all over Anglesey but Cemaes decided to keep theirs open by charging  20p towards maintenance and very nice they are too. The town is colourful, the bay is very scenic and the beautiful  Llanbadrig Church, a 5th century Anglesey Church founded by St. Patrick, is well worth a visit.

 

 

Morning Visit to Cemlyn Bay

To try and get better light on the Tern colony , we visited Cemlyn the following morning. The Sandwich Terns were busy bringing in fish to the colony where pairs were still displaying even though many chicks have fledged and their parents returned south. Other species - Black-Headed Gull already in winter plumage, Little Egret, Common Tern (black tip to bill), Arctic Tern, Grey Heron, Oyster Catcher and Greenshank.

Cemlyn Bay Ternery and Beach

Cemlyn’s curved bay is unique with its shingle ridge known as Esgair Cemlyn dividing the open sea from a saline coastal lagoon. The bay and surrounding land forms part of the Cemlyn Estate which is owned by the National Trust but the North Wales Wildlife Trust lease the lagoon area  with its extensive tern colony which is deemed nationally important as it is home to the only breeding colony of Sandwich terns in Wales.  The lagoon was created in the 1930s by Captain Vivian Hewitt who built a dam and a weir, changing the saltmarsh area into the lagoon. He had a keen interest in birds and lived on the western side of the bay. Pictures here of the scenery and some Sandwich Terns from an afternoon visit with the family. More pics to follow from morning visit the next day.

South Stacks in the Fog and Sun

When we arrived at South Stacks, it was very foggy and very eerie with the calls of all the hundreds of Guillemots, Gulls, etc and the fog horn sounding from the Lighthouse. The cloud cleared periodically giving beautiful views of the Stack and Lighthouse and lots of flying Gulls, Rock Pipit, Chough and Kestrel (bird images from JPEGS as I don't download RAW while away) 

 

Plas Newydd Tale of Two Marquesses

Plas Newydd, set in gardens, parkland and woodland, with views over the Menai strait and Snowdonia, has its origins in 1470, and evolved over the centuries to become one of Anglesey's principal residences. It was greatly altered in the 18th century by James Wyatt, who refaced it, blended the towers into the building front, and constructed the large Gothic style stable block. In 1812, the estate passed to Henry William Paget, who raised a regiment of volunteers in the 1790s. By 1802 he was a major-general, and in 1815 was appointed cavalry commander, leading a spectacular charge of the British heavy cavalry at the Battle of Waterloo. In recognition of his heroism he was created the 1st Marquess of Anglesey, although he lost a leg from one of the last cannon shots of the day. The 5th Marquess was infamous for converting the Chapel to a Gaiety Theatre and performing a spectacular dance in the costume shown here. He died young after frittering away £43million on fancy dress.

 In the 1930s the artist Rex Whistler was a regular visitor to Plas Newydd and painted the largest canvas painting in the UK. It is a trompe-l'oeil seascape painting that fills a whole wall of the dining room with an imagined scene of Italianate churches, castles, Snowdonian mountains and a complete harbour wall, with tricks of perspective that mean the scenes appear to change when seen from different parts of the room.