Today was a quiet day, partly because we judged the weather wrong. Whilst we have been on Anglesey the weather has changed from the forecast every day….often for the better but today should have been the driest of the weekend but when we cycled down to Benllech before lunch it started to rain the moment we got to the beach.
The beach was lovely but it was cleared by the rain in about one minute. We vainly attempted to shelter under the overhang of an ice cream kiosk roof but gave up and cycled back to the van as quick as we could. We had achieved the important task of buying a Sunday newspaper, so we had some reading material for the afternoon. The weather did pick up and we did get out for a decent bike ride around the nearby countryside.
Monday 17th May 2021 - South Stack car park, near Holyhead.
Our wildcamp destination today is as far north and west as you can get on Holy Island. It is a haven for ‘birders’ or should I call them ‘twitchers’? Certainly not ‘doggers’ anyway! The cliffs are home to gulls, guillemots, razorbills and puffins! I had also been told that the elusive Chough could be found here too. I have sought out Choughs in Cornwall and in Pembrokeshire but to no avail.
We couldn’t see any puffins until….
I called it the ‘only puffin on the island’! It made Janice happy.
We went for an afternoon walk up the highest point which is Holyhead Mountain which had great views on such a lovely day.
Back down at South Stack we walked away from the main bird cliffs and spotted a black bird. I watched a little closer to see it had the red beak and red legs and feet. The wings had a quite distinctive fingered look. It was joined by black bird number two and I deduced that they were a pair of choughs! In my tradition of taking pictures of birds so far away that you can’t tell what they are I took this snap….
Around five o’clock, once most of the cars had disappeared we adjusted the vans position to get a better view…..here it is.
The mountains in the distance are Snowdonia and the Lleyn Peninsula stretching to the right. We haven’t had a comparable overnight view since we stayed at Duncansby Head at the very top of Scotland looking over to Orkney. Unfortunately we have no whisky on this occasion to sip as the sun goes down.
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