Skip to main content

Whistling Sands

The campsite at Morfa Nefyn is at Porth Dinllaen Farm (no website but there’s a link here) and has been run for five seasons by an on-site warden and his wife.

Eric retired from the army and decided to do this. As a quartermaster in such places as Kuwait and Afghanistan, he has all the right credentials and you can see his influence. CoVID19 security was tight with gels mandatory entering and leaving the kitchen or washrooms. These are cleaned three times a day. Who else would do this early and late?



Next season, post-Eric, the farm family are apparently going to run the site. I wouldn’t want to judge but looking at the farm, I doubt that they will be as effective as Eric.

We moved on towards our next campsite at the end of the peninsula, stopping off at the NT car park above the Whistling Sands beach, Porth Oer. Here the sand is supposed to whistle when you walk on it but we weren’t holding our breath, as a camper had been and said nothing happened when he tried!

Firstly though we had a great conversation with a couple driving a Land Rover 88” in original shabby condition. The payment machine indicated that an app could be used and so I did. However mine was out of date and needed an update and then re-entry of my credentials. There was the modern version of a queue; not people searching for change or trying to enter details into a dodgy keypad. Rather we were all heads down in our phones, entering details like vehicle type ( I almost used our Golf which was already setup).

Then of course I needed the loo and this made me chuckle. 



The beach is fabulous and you can indeed make the sand whistle. Although, as Edmund Hyde Hall put it so eloquently in c1810, “ it emits a shrill crackling noise, curious certainly but very offensive to the sense of hearing”.



We went for a swim. I know it’s September and so the water is supposed to be warm. It wasn’t. Not a bit. We had a good swim and full immersion but after ten/fifteen minutes we were ready to get out. Let’s just say that it took most of the rest of the day to get warm even after a romp up and along the cliff! 😁





Labels:

Comments

Rachel said…
Fantastic post - impressed that you swam.. Phil and I managed a sea swim in West Runton which was also a bit on the chilly side. Feels good afterwards though (once you manage to eventually get warm). Good for you too, all that freezing water!
11 September 2020 at 18:35
Tim said…
Thanks Rach 😁
11 September 2020 at 18:45
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Potes and environs

Potes is a bustling town that’s clearly ‘in the mountains’ but isn’t quite a mountain town. Well that was what we thought until we went for a walk. More on that later. First we got to know the site ( Camping La Viorna ) and the neighbours. After the squeeze of the first night near the pool, we were upgraded to a pitch at the end of the lowest terrace which had a superb view of the eastern massive of the Picos. So although this was still a squeeze pitch, somehow we felt good about it. The ‘squeeze’ happened later in the day. ☺️ Happily our immediate neighbours were quiet Dutchland people who like to eat their tea early and retire in good time. They always enjoy taking to us Brits, rather than those Germans and soon I was engaged because I was asked a question. “Why do you have a UK flag on your number plate, rather than a Welsh Scottish or English flag?”. Tricky! I explained that England isn’t a country like Wales or Scotland. They have their own  parliaments and make rules for them...
5 comments
Read more

First views of the Picos

 Santillana del Mar comes as a surprise to those of us that haven’t done the prep and read about this place. Fancy having planning controls going back to the 16C. when you have such amazing stone buildings. This town is a tourist town certainly but it’s thoroughly deserved. Beautiful sturdy Cotswold stone coloured buildings are everywhere. The stone quoins, lintols and supports are impressive but there’s plenty of substantial hefty cross sections of wood too. We wander the streets, looking at the wares aimed at us tourists but encounter cascades of water from the roof tiles. It’s raining and there are no gutters! The bar is welcoming and we cleverly order dos cañas de cerveza  having learnt this glass size from a bartender in Tenerife. We are rewarded with a plate of crisps too and settle on the bar stools, wondering whether to eat here. Unfortunately we discuss this for too long and the tables fill and we are left on the bar stools until we decide to wander again. Inside...
6 comments
Read more

Lago del Valle

Continuing the walking theme, the next day we drove up another of the five valleys that connect with Pola de Somiedo, to get to a suitable start point. This was just below the last hamlet, Outeiro which is at the end of the tarmac. The intention was to walk from there, up to the corrie / cwm of Lago del Valle. The snag of the day was that as we set off to drive the narrow steep road up the gorge from the campsite, we immediately caught up with a full size concrete lorry, This was making its way to that last village and el driver was  not in a mood to pull over. So we had time to look at the gorge-that-becomes-a-high-valley. It’s hard to describe these landscapes. They are severe, incredibly scenic, remote and completely unspoilt. They are also so near the ferry ports of the coast that only £800 separates them from more campervan travellers from Great Britain (& Northern Island). We started the walk and soon saw the concrete which had already been dropped for the pad of a build...
5 comments
Read more