News, Views, Reviews, Photos

Portmeirion (The Village)

ByKevin Simon

Sep 3, 2010

We have just visited portmeirion in Gwynedd North Wales, here are my thoughts on the visit, prices for adults are £8 children £4 and there are family deals as well that saves you a few pounds on entry. Parking is free and you can leave the village and re-enter again on the same day, the day we went it was open from 9:30am to 7:30pm. You can buy different guides on entrance or you can pick up a free map & guide.

Portmeirion is probably best know for the location of the village in the cult 60’s tv program the prisoner starring Patrick McGoohan as number six, which was filmed in the village in 1966-67. I have visited portmeirion before a few years ago as I am a fan of the tv show, and thought I would go again.

Here is a little information about the village, Clough Williams – Ellis Brought the land in 1925 and started work on his vision of a tightly grouped Village, the building he wanted to grow as building went on, he had some plans, but mostly they just grew as construction went on. Portmeirion was built in two stages the first being between 1925-1939 the second stage was between 1954 – 1976 were the gaps were filled in. Some of the building were salvaged, Clough once said the village was ” A home for fallen buildings”  Portmeirion is now owned by the charity “Clough Williams-Ellis Foundation and the grounds and village are managed by Portmeirion Ltd.

Once you enter portmeirion you pay at the Tollgate and then walk down past the Portmeirion pottery seconds warehouse, walk through the gate house towards the bridge house , these are walk through Arch ways ,the village is amazingly beautiful, all the building are very brightly coloured, the architecture is amazing, some of my favorites are the bell tower which was built in 1928, the round house, this is only a small building but has great charm. The pantheon this is a octagonal building with a dome at the top. The piazza is just the most relaxing place with a fountain pool in the centre with differnt building surrounding it including the gloriette,the bristol colonnade and the Gothic pavilion.

The gardens are all well kept with all sorts of different plant and flowers, these are all very colourful at the time we visited. Once you have looked around the centre you can walk down towards the beach area. Here there is the hotel & restaurant, this is by the boat which really isn’t a normal boat as made out of concrete, you can walk around this with great views of the village above you and the bay in front of you. We then walked towards the lighthouse.

We went on the one woodland walk, this one was from towards the top of the village, by the triumphal arch, There is a audio visual presentation within the playhouse building, this presentation lasts around 25mins, the film tells you about the history of the village etc. .

The woodland walk we walked on went to the viewpoint, this gives you great views of the bay / estuary and surrounding area’s, you can just sit there and relax with the great view infront of you, which you do need after the walking to this point 🙂 we then walked to the ghost garden, we wasn’t too sure were this lead to, we thought the beach but unfortunately the paths at some point were so think to walk through we decided to head back to the village. Within the woodland there is a small play area though this is more for younger children. On this path you go past the Chinese bridge and pagoda, and from there you can walk upto the gazebo, this was built in 1983 to mark the centenary of Clough’s birth. from here you get amazing views above the village.

There are two main walks that are on the map each should take around 30 – 40mins.  We had taken our own lunch so I’m not sure of the prices of food onsite, but we did have some icecream and the prices were very reasonable. there are several place to eat within the village also there is Castell Deudrath hotel that is just the otherside of the car park that do serve food aswell.

Portmeirion is a very beautiful a relaxing place to visit, as being a fan of the prisoner, it was great for me to go back there and enjoy the views, and the day we went the weather was great so this made it even better for us. This is a place I would even visit again if I get the chance, there are so many great things about the Portmeirion the buildings aswell as just looking at the different sculptures around, there is more than I can describe on here, so I defiantly would recommend a visit to Portmeirion so you can see for yourselves why I like this place so much.

Have a look at some of my photos from the day by clicking the link below or clicking on the link to my photo albums at the top of the page.

Be seeing you 🙂

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I am not a number i’m a free man.

By Kevin Simon

I run this blog & also self employed cleaning out fish ponds, but due to spinal problems not able to do as much, now started a youtube channel showing my converted Peugeot Partner micro camper also as interest in photography so now vlog about the trips and of course Lego figures out in the wild photos.

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