Wrexham; Saturday, 29 June, 2019
The aqueduct is the second highest in Europe, but also claims to be the highest navigable aqueduct in the world (all the higher ones not being navigable). I picked up the first tour of the morning on a narrow boat that heads out from the basin and over to the aqueduct. The trough of the aqueduct is only slightly wider than the boats themselves, so there is a strict whoever is on the aqueduct has right of way rule, with everything travelling in that direction keeping right of way until the aqueduct is clear. Thankfully there were only a few canoeist heading towards us when we arrived at the end, so we only had to wait a couple of minutes before starting our crossing.
The crossing is very spectacular, particularly if you sit on the site that doesn’t have the towpath as the lip of the trough is only a foot or so above the level of the water, meaning you can look out (and down) from the boat with an unobstructed view. Beyond the aqueduct the boat carries on for about a half mile to the town of Froncysyllte where there is space in the canal for the boat to turn around and head back.
Arriving back in Trevor I headed up to the main road and caught the bus back into Wrexham where I made a quick bus change and picked up the bus out to Denbigh. The bus took a very picturesque route through the hills of Denbighshire, taking nearly 90 minutes to make the journey. Denbigh was an important place in the middle ages and Edward I fortified the town to help his control of the Welsh lands.
High on a hill above the town centre are the ruins of the castle, and that was were I was heading to, though I first stopped off at Burgess Gate, a large gate on the old city walls, and now housing a small exhibition on the history of the town. I took a short walk along a bit of the city walls to stop off at Leicester’s Church, which was supposed to be an impressive building when it was being planned, but only a small part of it was ever actually built and it turned straight away into a ruin. I then headed up the last part of the hill, past St Hilary's Chapel, to the castle itself.
I spent quite a bit of time exploring the castle, taking in the views from the towers, and then stopping for a well needed bottle of lemonade in the café. From the castle it’s possible to borrow a key to let yourself onto the city walls, which aren’t totally open to the public due to their slightly ruinous state. I borrowed the key and headed back down to Leicester’s Church where the entrance onto the walls starts. I was able to walk most of the way around the walls, though the final couple of hundred yards are currently closed, so I couldn’t complete a total circuit back to the castle, instead I had to come back on myself to get back to the castle to drop the key back off.
From the castle I wandered back down to the centre of town to pick up the bus, and as I had a rover ticket I decided to keep going towards the coast, picking up the bus coming in from Wrexham and continuing onto Rhyl.
In Rhyl I had a quick wander round the town centre, but then it was time to head back to the bus station and catch the bus along the North Wales coast to Chester, following the railway line a lot of the way the views from the ride weren’t as impressive as I was expecting.
In Chester I changed again, onto the bus back down to Wrexham, but here I’d managed to time things badly as the races at Chester racecourse were just finishing and the town was struggling to cope with the traffic, so it took the best part of 30 minutes to get from the station to the other side of the racecourse, but from then on it was a pretty smooth journey down into Wales and onto Wrexham, with the advantage of the bus stopping right by the hotel.
I headed up to my room to cool off for a little while before once again heading down to the onsite restaurant for dinner and another early night.
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