As someone who has a birdwatching hobby, I learned that there was a place in the UK where you could see puffins during breeding season, as well as a plethora of other wildlife, such as various marine animals, including seals. In addition to seeing all this wildlife, it happens to be in a location off the shore of the Pembrokeshire National Park, which has a portion of the coastal pathway, where I learned there were some great hikes and views from a work colleague who lives in the area. So we took a trip to Wales, a new part of the UK for both of us, and stayed in Haverfordwest, a 4 1/2 hour train ride from London Paddington Station, and which was in between the launch points I needed to be at to get to Skomer Island, where the puffins breed.
Before I detail our experiences in these locations, I wanted to note a couple of things I picked up, researched, and learned about the Welsh people and language. Many indigenous languages have disappeared from the region, including Breton and Cornish. Some languages are barely hanging on, such as Scottish Gaelic, which is trying to make a comeback, though it's slow. In Wales, about 20% of the population speak Welsh, and there has been a concerted effort to keep this language alive. Indeed, it was really satisfying to hear people speaking Welsh on the train as we were heading there, giving one hope that the language will continue. I read a blog post about how to pronounce Welsh place names since they appear so impossible, and it seemed to me that the language has similar guttural sounds to Gaelic (or Irish, as Irish Gaelic is called in Ireland). As I continued to research Welsh heritage, I learned that they are indeed a Celtic people and language. So, my impression was right! And we started noticing some similarities, such as place names in Ireland and Wales that look similar; in fact, Ireland is a short boat ride away, only 19km coast to coast at its shortest distance, with the ability to see the land across the water on a clear day. There were also Celtic motifs and designs used in certain signs. You can see them in the photos of the bust stop and Cleddau Cafe (you might have to zoom in). So it was very interesting for me to learn a little bit about Welsh heritage and its shared origins with Scotland and Ireland.
Haverfordwest (Hwlffordd, in Welsh)
We arrived mid-afternoon at our destination, so it allowed us some time to walk around town a little after checking in and before eating dinner. The narrow, Claddau (pronounced "KLA-thy," I believe) river runs through the town, and there are several businesses along either side of it and several small bridges. Perhaps not the most scenic, it is still quaint and welcoming, in my opinion. The centre of town was also much more decorated for the Queen's Platinum Jubilee than London is--there were crocheted decorations all over trees and poles, as well as crocheted Royal Guardsmen over all the bollards. All this in addition to a series of tapestries of things relating to Queen Elizabeth in front the Council hall.
My colleague had mentioned that there was a castle in town that we could visit, so we decided to try to find it, not realising that the town is pretty much built around it, and it was quite a bit closer than I imagined, about a 10-minute walk from our hotel! The castle was first built by Flemish settlers in the 1100s and changed ownership on several occasions, even once being given as a gift to Anne Boleyn from Henry VIII. The ruins themselves are quite lovely. There is a museum there that was closed by the time we visited, and the view wasn't the best since you just see the town around you, but we enjoyed ourselves nonetheless. There is a well-manicured garden area within the ruins, as some of the surrounding buildings are still able to be used for offices and the museum. The land surrounding the castle has also been used to help support local wildlife as well, so there are native flowering plants for the pollinators, and nest boxes have been set up for swallows and bats. Some areas were designed for hedgehogs to live in. There are certain areas that are off limits to the public for this reason.
Having walked around the high street and surrounding area, we saw many more independent shops, and while many places are short-staffed, evidenced by the "staff wanted" signs we saw, we didn't see as many businesses shut down as we have in other places we've been, victims of the pandemic. It's fun to live in London, but it's also nice to be in a place where it doesn't seem to get really crowded, though perhaps it does a bit more during summer holidays with visiting vacationers, and my impression is skewed by the time of year we visited. There isn't a whole lot to do in Haverfordwest (or Hwlfford, I believe pronounced as "HOOL-furth"), but there is much to do in the surrounding area, which was the reason we visited. I almost thought it wasn't going to happen, our excursion to Skomer Island the next day, as I received an email from the company the night we arrived in Haverfordwest, stating that the weather forecast was possibly going to cause the trip to be cancelled due to the poor conditions for boating, but I was so thankful that conditions changed overnight, and the trip was able to go ahead. After all, that was my main reason for this trip, and it would have been really disappointing to not get to do it!
Skomer Island
There are a few islands off the coast of Pembrokeshire: Skokholm, Grassholm, Ramsey, and the largest of them all, Skomer. The only one that has a resident on it is Ramsey Island, where a warden with the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) lives there, and it's probably about a 10-15-minute boat ride from the coast. Skomer Island allows for overnight stays that you can book, with the main purpose being to see a bird known as the Manx shearwater, which burrows or fishes out at sea by day and then flies around in more safety with the cover of darkness at night. Otherwise, no one lives there, and there are minimal facilities and shelter, just one washroom facility, visitor centre, and picnic area in an old farmhouse from when a family used to inhabit the island until the 1950s or so. We actually visited this island on the two full days we had in the area, but the first day was what they call a landing tour, meaning you get off the boat to hike around the island, and on the next day, we did just a boat tour, which I thought would allow us to get a different perspective of the island. I originally booked the boat tour to include Ramsey Island, but due to lack of numbers, the company offered me another time in a more comfortable boat that sounded like it would include Ramsey, but we just skirted past it on the way back and didn't get to actually stop there for viewing, so I don't know what happened. Anyway, as I share info about Skomer Island, I'll include both days of visits since the boat trip was a little underwhelming and doesn't need its own subsection or blog entry.
Getting to the launch point for the landing tour is not accessible by public transportation, so we took a taxi to Lockley Lodge Visitor Centre, the meeting point for the tour. It's also a little gift and confectionary shop, and you can also buy last minute supplies like sunscreen, lip balm, and Kleenex, and you can even buy binoculars if you want. I ended up buying a sweatshirt with a puffin on it, not because I love logo shirts but because the thin wool cardigan I brought to wear over my shirt didn't seem like it was going to keep me warm enough that day, as I was already freezing within a few minutes of getting out of the taxi. It was a good purchase as it kept me warm and comfortable the whole weekend. The other neat thing they have in the visitor centre is a live cam from the island, and we could already see a lot of puffins. I didn't really know what to expect on the island, where the puffins would be or how easy it would be to see them--like maybe they all go fishing at a certain time of day when I'm there!--but I saw in the live feed that they had congregated at least in one area, so I was excited to know that I would definitely see them on the visit. The scenery alone from the launch point/visitor centre is already quite pretty, and I was already getting bird, insect, and landscape photos before even getting to the island.
The boat ride to Skomer from that launch point is only about 15 minutes long. As you get closer to the island, you start to see these birds flying around everywhere like bullets, and you realise they are puffins! There are also guillemots and razorbills, all of whom hang out together. And they are swimming in the water in large numbers, and then you start seeing that they are everywhere on the island. You get off the boat, and even as you're walking up the staircase, the puffins are everywhere, and you just want to stay there and get tons of photos! But there are many more to come, just that when you don't know what to expect, you think you should take advantage while you can. Once reaching the top of the staircase from the landing point, there is a volunteer to greet everyone and give people the rules of the island--the golden rule being "stay on the path." This is because, as we learned, puffins, Manx shearwaters, and razorbills are burrowing birds, and as you discover once you get on the path, there are many burrows right next to the pathway, and so by going off the path, you can crush the burrow, killing the birds and babies/eggs contained therein.
For the majority of bird information, I have actually included it in my bird blog, so I will post some representative photos here, but for more photos and information about individual species, you can head over to my bird blog for those. If I don't separate them, this entry will become too bogged down with bird photos and info, and I already have a space for that type of information. To know which birds I saw on my Skomer trip, here is a list: puffins, razorbills, guillemots, great black-backed gulls (the only one I've seen before), white-fronted barn swallows, wheatear, oystercatcher, whitethroat, and meadow pipit. This way you're not looking at the list of all the birds and wondering which ones are from this trip. Birds that I saw flying but couldn't get photos of were one Manx shearwater, several gannets, and a few juvenile kittiwakes. The one point I will make here as a general piece of info is that Skomer Island and the surrounding waters are all protected land and waters because they are home to so many breeding birds, some of which have been experiencing declining numbers. There are about 700,000 Manx shearwaters (350K breeding pairs), 25,000 guillemots (12.5K breeding pairs), 12,000 razorbills (6K breeding pairs) and 40,000 puffins (20K breeding pairs) that nest/burrow on the island, so there was no lack of birds to see, even if the shearwaters were not visible during the day.
Aside from the birds, one of the most impressive things about the island, at least at this time of year, is that much of it is covered in bluebells, a different variety, it seems, from the ones found in the woodlands, as the ones in this region seem to bend or curl over. It makes for some really spectacular colour on the island. You'll also see other native flowers like red campion, white campion, pink sea thrift, and other flowers I don't know. May is the season for the bluebells, and apparently June is when the red campion takes over, but there were scenes where the bluebells mixed with the red campion, creating its own pointillist painting but a natural one instead of on a canvas! The island is just under 3 squared km, and you can walk around the perimeter of the island, enjoying gorgeous coastal views, the natural teal blue appearance of the water, and of course, thousands of birds and other wildlife, such as rabbits and butterflies. The island also has its own vole, but we didn't get to see any of those. If you're lucky, you can also spot porpoises, dolphins, and seals. I didn't get to see either porpoises or dolphins, but my husband spotted a pair of seals on a large rock jutting out from the water during our boat trip. It was hard to get a lot of good photos since we were bobbing around--the boat isn't large enough to be really stable for telephoto lenses, but I was able to get some decent shots in spite of that, so I was very excited to see seals, which I've never seen in the wild before outside of a little nose peeking up above the ocean on a work trip to California. The seal story, I hope, will end well. When we returned to the hotel, and I was going through my photos on my camera, I noticed something on one of the seals that didn't look right: what appeared to be cord or twine around its neck, some sort of broken off netting, and it appeared to be embedded in its skin. I don't know where or how to report wildlife in distress here, so I decided to contact the boat company as I figured they would probably work with and know who to call at the Wildlife Trust, the organisation that looks after Skomer Island. I sent them snapshots from my camera and described which tour I was on and the name of the fellow steering the boat so that he could help to provide a more exact location as to where we spotted the seals. The company got back to me the next day to thank me for contacting them. They told me they had called the RSPB warden on Ramsey Island, and they all thanked me for contacting them and helping out and that the warden would take it from there. I sure hope they keep me updated, and at least the seal has a chance at survival now that they know about it.
The weather ended up cooperating more than expected. We had a lot of sunshine on both days, and my husband and I even got a bit of redness on our faces from the water reflecting the sun during our boat trip on day 2. But our landing tour had one bout of rain that lasted for probably a good 45 minutes to an hour, and although we had dressed for the rain, we still got soaked. We were thankful to discover that the old farmhouse actually had a small covered area where we could take shelter, and when we arrived, there were quite a few people there! Shortly after we arrived, having battled the rain to get there, the sun came out. We had got around the island quickly enough that we had about an hour to spare before the boat returned for pickup, so we decided to rest there a bit, and as the air came through, and more so once we got back out into the sunshine, we started to dry off. After our Cornwall trip last year, I learned I didn't have adequate hiking and trekking type clothing, so I've since purchased some specialised clothing from Eddie Bauer, who I'm happy to say makes such clothing for those of us with a little extra girth, unlike similar stores in the UK, so I was shocked and amazed at how quickly my pants dried out and was comfortable again. My coat kept my dry as did my waterproof hiking boots, but my legs from the knee down were soaked, and the water ran down into my socks! I didn't even notice my feet were wet until we got back to the hotel, and I took my boots off. After the rain, and especially with the sun having come out, the island seemed to sparkle. All the colours of the flowers appeared brighter, and even the one of the boat staff on our day 2 trip mentioned how that happens, too, so apparently it's not just us who have noticed this phenomenon.
As I mentioned, the boat trip was a little underwhelming. I had thought it would take us around the island and allow me to get a different vantage point for seeing birds, but the launch point is close to Ramsey Island, and it took about 45 minutes just to get to Skomer from there. They take you close to the same dock as the landing tour, and then just turn off the engine for about 15 minutes so you can view the birds around the boat more closely and take photos. Then before you know it, you're on your way back already. One of the good things about the launch point is that it sits right on the Pembrokeshire Coastal Path, so once we returned to the mainland, we walked up the path a little ways and found a bench to just look out and enjoy the scenery and the fresh air. We would normally have hiked for a little while, but my husband had actually developed a cold the day we left for Wales, and he was pretty tired, so that's why we decided to just sit and relax rather than hike more--and we had already enjoyed a lot of the coastal scenery as it was. The other good thing about this location is that there are also buses that run there. So we had taken a taxi to get there, just to ensure we arrived on time (and the taxi driver was excellent, a local person who scuba dives around Skomer, so she had lots of local wisdom to share, including how mean the puffins are, attacking divers and using them as "poop targets," as she called it; she said she just wanted to let us know what they're really like despite how cute they are! haha. Coming back, we waited for the bus to take us to the beautiful city of St. David's, the second smallest city in the UK (you can only be a city if you have your own cathedral, apparently), and from St. David's we could take another bus back to Haverfordwest. We had hoped to spend more time at St. David's, most importantly having a good bite to eat there, but by the time we arrived, it was too much in the late afternoon, so restaurants had closed their kitchens, being too late for lunch and too early for dinner. We saw that there was a bus coming in a few minutes, the next one not coming for 2 hours, so we figured we might as well just go back at that point.
I wanted to note something interesting we learned about taxis as well. The hotel staff advised me that it might be difficult to get a taxi for the Friday during peak hours, when we needed it, since taxis take kids to school. I couldn't believe what kind of wealth must be there for kids to take taxis every day, but with the driver we had on day 2, I was able to ask her about this. It turns out that the regional Council contracts out certain taxi companies for school runs for kids that are attending special schools for kids special needs. These schools are located outside Haverfordwest, for the most part, and there aren't school buses for them, so the Council pays taxi companies a set fee to do this. I thought that was fascinating. We were able to find a company that doesn't do the school runs, thankfully, but if you ever do travel there during regular school days, be forewarned that you'll need to factor this into your trip planning.
Pembrokeshire is definitely another place I'd go back to in a heartbeat. I really loved it, and people there were super friendly and helpful. Even the hotel staff were knowledgeable and could make recommendations for public transportation and things to do. We haven't yet rented a vehicle since arriving, and we seem to have done pretty well getting to some great places using public transportation. I doubt we'll have time to visit there again, but if I do get the chance, I'll be pretty happy about it.
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