Back at the Ty Coch

A couple of Land Rover 110s arrived on Saturday morning and by the afternoon we were chatting. The guys were very interested in our lifting roof and had a tour as we explained the set-up. They are from Nomad in Macclesfield, a company that sells Land Rover accessories, provides all sorts of upgrades and also ECU remaps from Alive Tuning.

We looked at their ‘blingy’ vehicles with some admiration and promised to call and see them at Nomad / M&R Motors. It’s handy to know that they are next to the famous Shufflebotham’s cloth and fabric outlet.

Mike Woodier (Nomad) is a long term visitor to this previously quiet ‘site’ and was a little shocked to see so many visitors. We are all staycationers now though, as we were originally planning to be abroad and he was supposed to be at the Adventure Overland Show.

CoVID19 has really affected all aspects of life. Farmer Chris, once able to leave a few campers to themselves, now has to sleep in his caravan on the busiest nights. He certainly conducts frequent sweeps of the site on a quad bike or Izuzu pick up.

The fantastic weather continued although this is a windy peninsula and this cliff a particularly windy spot. We needed to strap down all flaps again before it was possible to sleep.

As we have seen everywhere, a camper’s essential kit includes a big brazier and huge supply of logs. We were shown a particularly handy log burner that packed away very efficiently into a very handy pack. This was just as well because the volume of logs and kindling that are carried is unbelievable!

So we had three more nights of this fantastic late summer weather and needed one more site.  We decided on a second visit to Eric the Quartermaster at Porthdinllaen near Morfa Nefyn. It was a little risky as it would be a Saturday night but there was room and we settled again in the middle of the no-hookup field.

The first outing was to the Ty Coch (Red House) pub on the beach. A festival atmosphere was all around and we joined the queue for a beer, happy that the brisk breeze would disperse Coronavirus droplets.

Then we made a return visit towards Whistling Sands, walking southwest along the coast for about 2.5 miles. When we arrived it was clear that something was afoot as several groups of people were strategically placed.

There were now nearly thirty seals in the bay. One of the pups was still on the beach as before but looking much bigger. The other was on the rocks with adults but still looking pup-like. There were a few skirmishes when a male (seal 😱) approached the pup and there was a lot of howling too. A seal howl sounds rather like a Tawny owl crossed with a wolf. I hope that helps.

On the walk back I realised that the pebbly beaches here are a result of erosion at the top of the beach. We have seen much evidence of this in these parts.

With the sun on our backs the view towards the  hills was a perfect reminder of what makes this peninsula so attractive.