Woolly says – With a mammoth breakfast consumed I was ready for anything; it was time to go on a goat hunt. Jo had suggested we walk but having told her in no uncertain terms that this mammoth is not made for walking she opened the car up and we all dived in, well, Alfie the Dog jumped in, Jo lifted me in and slid in herself. A toll booth took our money which allowed us onto one of Llandudno’s biggest attractions, the Great Orme.
The archaeology and history of the Great Orme show that for many thousands of years, the area has been a place of settlement from the Stone Age through to today. There are currently more than 400 known sites of archaeological and historical interest on the Orme which is managed as a country park and it has a number of protective designations including Special Area of Conservation, Heritage Coast and Site of Special Scientific Interest.
In 1826 the summit of the Great Orme was chosen as the location for one of the 11 optical semaphore stations that would form an unbroken 80 mi (130 km) chain from Liverpool to Holyhead. The original semaphore station, which consisted of small building with living accommodation, used a 15 m (49 ft) ship’s mast with three pairs of moveable arms to send messages to either Puffin Island 7 mi (11 km) to the west or 8.5 mi (13.7 km) to Llysfaen in the east. Skilled telegraphers could send semaphore messages between Liverpool and Holyhead in under a minute.
By the 1860’s the Victorians had turned it into a tourist destination and the semaphore station was changed into a summit café providing refreshments to the visitors.
As we started along the road with the sea on our right and the craggy rock face on our left, I kept a sharp look out for goats. Since the late nineteenth century a herd of Kashmiri goats have roamed the Great Orme headland with the origins of the Kashmiri goat found in the mountains of India. The goats were imported into Europe for their cashmere during the 1800’s during the reign of George IV. The goats found themselves in Llandudno when the then Lord Mostyn acquired a pair from the Royal Herd and brought them to his Gloddaeth Estate on the outskirts of Llandudno in the late 1800’s. They were then released onto The Great Orme and continue to thrive today. Earlier in the year they made headlines as with all the humans being locked down the goats arrived into the town to see where they were. I let out a loud squeak as I had my first sighting and Jo quickly pulled into the side of the road and leapt out to take a snap shot.
I could see this happening rather a lot as we continued along the route with my small companion shouting ‘goat’ every few feet, having explained that I wasn’t going to take a picture of every goat he calmed down.
Woolly says – As we started the climb to the summit, I was delighted to find ourselves outside the pretty church of St. Tudno’s. The church has been a site of Christian worship since the 6th century, when the Celtic monk Tudno (pronounced “Tidno”) brought the word of God to the people here. It had certainly expanded over the years and its fascinating graveyard was rather large. We wandered round admiring the headstones and monuments that celebrated former residents’ lives. The view across the sea was lovely with the exception of the wind turbines out in the bay.
As we drove higher and higher, I could feel the wind buffeting the car as we wound our way upwards and into the summit’s car park. As Jo opened her door it nearly joined the turbines as did Jo as huge gusts of wind belted across the open space. Alfie the Dog was game and eagerly jumped out the car only to find himself being blown sideways, I took the sensible course of action and hid in Jo’s coat.
I’d hoped that we would manage a good walk but with the gale forces it wasn’t going to happen, we made it across the car park and I tried to take some pictures whilst holding on the camera, the dog, the mammoth and my hat all of which were likely to blow away.
Woolly says – I took the brave measure of looking out as we arrived at the tram station. In 1902, the Great Orme Tramway was built to convey visitors to the top of the Great Orme which must have been quite a feat of building, today the shed doors were firmly locked and all we could do was stare at the track. In 1969, the Llandudno Cable Car was also constructed to take visitors up to the summit attractions, given the weather conditions this doesn’t run all of the time and to be honest the chances of making it safely up in a small dangling glass box would be unlikely today.
We set off for our journey downwards and pulled in at the Bronze Age Mining centre, also closed due to Covid. Mining had begun around 4,000 years ago during the Bronze Age with the opening of several copper mines. The copper ore malachite was mined using stones and bone tools with an estimation that up to 1,760 tonnes of copper was mined during the period. The mine was most productive in the period between 1400 and 1700, after which most of the readily accessible copper had been extracted. The site was so productive that by 1600, there were no other copper mines left open in Britain because they could not compete with the Great Orme, well done to the Orme I say.
The mine was abandoned and evidence suggests it was not worked again until the late 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. Mining began in the late 17th century due to the demand for copper and improved ability to pump water out of the mine. A steam engine was introduced in 1832 and ten years later an 822 metre long tunnel was mined at sea level to drain the deeper mine workings. Commercial scale mining on the Great Orme ended in the 1850s, although small scale mining continued until the mines were finally abandoned in 1881. In 1987, the improvement of the derelict mine site was commissioned by the local council and Welsh Development Agency. The area was to be landscaped and turned into a car park. Since excavation began in 1987, over 5 miles (8.0 km) of prehistoric tunnels have been discovered which put a stop to the silly idea of a carpark. Today we could only peer over the fence but it did look impressive from the small portion that was visible.
We continued along the road which bore warnings of rock falls.
It went through my mind that an insurance claim for the car reading, ‘it was smashed to pieces by a large rock landing on the roof whilst looking for goats’ might cause some entertainment to the insurance clerks.
Woolly says – Finally we re-joined civilization and pulled up next to the West Shore Beach. Our walk along was windy but manageable and as Alfie the Dog raced here, there and everywhere I wondered how high the waves could actually go, within moments I had ascertained that they would certainly cover Jo as one came within inches of her and she smartly stepped out of the way before racing past before the next one could soak us all.
It was a very near miss and as I turned to tell the mammoth to watch out in case he got washed out to sea all I could see was his bottom racing across the green and straight into the road. I ran after him and caught up on the opposite side where he sat grinning just like the Cheshire Cat he had found.
Woolly says – another one for the collection and feeling that it might be a good time for a late lunch we headed back into the town to seek out some fish and chips, well we are at the seaside after all.