“Grab her between your legs and hold tight.”
Gwyn Thomas shows us how to steady the sheep as he shears it. The bleating ewe struggles to free itself, but in about two minutes flat, Thomas has the 100-pounds-of-fluff-on-four-legs looking as naked as a plucked chicken.
“Now you try,” he says, handing us the electric shears connected to the battery of his beat-up flatbed truck. Thomas sprints like a lamb to grab another sheep from his herd of nearly 1,000.
Thomas has the lean weathered face typical of a farmer and, though in his forties, is as nimble as a man half his age. He honchos a 753-acre sheep ranch in the heart of the sprawling and rugged Snowdonia mountain range in north Wales. And he readies the sheep for us neophytes.
The shears vibrate like a buzz saw and, unfortunately, our first unsteady cut nicks the sheep. The animal doesn’t wince, but we do. A pink welt rises quickly and an almost searing heat engulfs our hands. The wool is an extraordinary insulator, and the temperature at the lanolin line under the ewe’s coat must be well over 120 degrees.
When done properly, the coat shears off in a single puffy pelt, but our clippings come off in tatters. The plugs of wool reek of lamb and lanolin and look ratty enough never to wind up as anyone’s sweater. This wool, Thomas tells us, will wind up in carpets. And he urges us to try again.
By the third sheep, we’re grateful we earn our living by writing rather than sheep shearing, though it’s hard not to admire Thomas’ grit.
Life in this steep mountain valley carpeted with nibbled green grass revolves almost exclusively around sheep–their well being and their cycles of life. Nor does Thomas’ daily routine differ much from most of his countrymen’s. This is sheep country and, in one way or another, everyone’s life is tied to wool and lamb chops.
A quirk of nature and a disaster have set the pattern for Thomas’ existence and for much of north Wales. Warm waters from the Caribbean course close to land here, but the 13 peaks of the Snowdonia range stopper the moist air, heated by those ocean currents, from spilling eastward through Wales into England. The resulting thick rains feed the steep valleys’ grasses and the sheep. And the sheep feed the people of north Wales.
The faithful rains once fostered valley after valley of fertile Welsh vineyards. And most of the people in north Wales cultivated grapes and made wine. But in 1349, the Black Plague took its toll on so many field hands that landowners were compelled to convert their vineyards into pasture.
Sheep have branded Thomas’ life. Now these docile creatures change ours. Up until this sun-filled afternoon, we had consumed lamb daily during our five-day sojourn in this verdant Lilliputian country. Now we see them more as Lamb Chop than lamb chops, and forswear their flesh forever. After shearing our fourth adorable sheep, we turn the shears back to Thomas.
Our journey to Wales began in Edinburgh, Scotland, where we ended a 10-day cruise around the British Isles. It seemed a pity to miss a chance to trace the intimate landscape of Wales. So we tag on a week of sightseeing by van that takes us from Conwy and Llandudno in north Wales to Cardiff, the country’s capital, in south Wales.
In the north, we find a people who, like Thomas, live and work outdoors. The curvaceous countryside is a patch quilt of small villages or towns. Blink and you’ve driven past them. Houses (many with slate roofs quarried from Snowdonia’s mountains) are few and far apart and usually nestled in woodlands.
Winding roadways–frequently clogged, of course, with clusters of sheep–are so narrow they seem more like driveways. Most drivers who try to cross Wale’s ubiquitous one-lane bridges back up to let someone else’s car pass.
Road rage is unheard of here. Indeed, life is simple. Shopkeepers take their time with us. Provisions for each meal we eat seem to have been grown or gathered by the chef’s own hand. Sounds that awaken us each morning are birdsongs and the rustling of leaves.
If north Wales was blessed with rain and sheep, the south garnered a mixed blessing– coal. By contrast, people in the south worked underground, developed black lung, struck their companies, and created wealth for merchants, manufacturers and shippers.
Today, Cardiff bustles with commerce and traffic; it is very much a city, with suburbs and commuters. Its quietest piece of real estate is Bute Park, attached to Cardiff Castle.
The difference between north and south is also visible in its vistas. The north’s storybook landscape and sinuous terrain are testimony to why an Angelsey farmer invented the Land Rover. Miles and miles of stone walls follow the earth’s contours and look like ever so many miniature Great Walls of China, with a druidic quality to them. And, of course, those balls of wool that graze in fields everywhere.
In Llandudno, we stay at the Bryn Derwen Hotel, a converted 19th Century private residence built originally for a wealthy China clay merchant. This seaside resort town is said to have more hotel rooms than the rest of Wales put together. Indeed, driving in along a promontory, the town opens to us like a pop-up greeting card. Row upon row of mostly white Victorian mansions lines the beachfront’s sweeping crescent.
Our introduction to the Bryn Derwen is typical of Welsh informality. The sweet fragrance of lilies wafts from the vestibule. Giddy laughter emanates from inside the hotel’s cozy sitting room. The inn’s other eight guests are using the opulent setting as a putting green. An old English sheepdog, Lucy, plays referee.
This friendly group from southwest England is on a golfing holiday. They’re the sort that cheerily say “tally ho” each morning. They quickly take us under their wing and make us part of their party in the parlor.
It’s easy to feel relaxed here, with the mood set by owners Stuart and Valerie Langfield. He is an award-winning chef who’s not beyond wearing turquoise rubber gloves when he’s cleaning up in his kitchen; she is an elfin sprite with unflagging energy and an ever-ready smile.
If Welsh cuisine is usually considered an oxymoron, Stuart’s cooking puts that to rest. Provisions and preparation are so good that even the ubiquitous “traditional” English breakfast takes on another luster here. “Once you’ve tasted Stuart’s cooking you can’t go anywhere else,” one frequent guest croons. And we dine there on a divine dish of chicken breast filled with a mushroom and spring onion stuffing, pan fried and served with a light-grain mustard and blue cheese sauce.
With the Bryn Derwen as our base for three days, we easily explore some of Wales’ more quirky towns. We discover the cluster of winding streets in Hay-on-Wye that harbors more than 40 bookshops, and a 13th Century castle wall in Conwy that conceals a tiny teapot museum.
One day, an urge to explore nature takes us to South Stack, a monumental vertical granite cliff face that juts from a turbulent sea at the tip of the Isle of Angelsey. A lighthouse anchors a tiny islet there. To reach it, we must descend a precipitous steep stone stairway of 409 steps, cross a slender 1,000-foot-long suspension bridge above the crashing waves, then back up again. The keening cries of kittiwakes, black guillemots and herring gulls pierce the morning mist that engulfs us. When it parts, the looming cliff face leaves us vertiginous, and we cling a bit tighter to the bridge’s rails.
On another day, we mount tawny Welsh Cobs for a horseback ride in Snowdownia National Park. English saddles straddle the horses, but after having hiked up those 409 steps, we’re not sure our tired legs can keep us clinging to them. We’d feel better on Western saddles, with something to hang onto. But our guide, Vicky Outram, suggests we put our faith in the horses: “In open countryside like this, you want something with brakes,” she quips. Her coordination is like choreography, and she promises to take it slow.
Our horses trod through lush hillocks of heather and treat them as if they were a salad-bar buffet, stopping frequently to nibble. No matter. It’s our chance to enjoy the view. The gourse-covered hills crest and dip. Beneath us spreads the pale blue Irish Sea; above us rise the peaks of Snowdonia. The day is crystal clear, and the sun catches in the translucent wings of a pure white cockatoo as it rises into the breeze. In the distance, a herd of wild mustangs frolics. When they hear us, they lift their heads, snort and gently gallop away.
A few days earlier, when sheep farmer Gwyn Thomas bid us farewell, he shared a Welsh custom. He had plucked us some “lucky” heather–lucky, he said, “because if it regenerates, you’ll come back to Wales next year.”
We don’t speak Welsh, but as our Brooklyn-born parents used to say, “From your mouth to God’s ears.”
IF YOU GO
STAYING THERE
Room rates at the Bryn Derwen Hotel (34 Abbey Road, Llandudno; phone /fax 011-44-1492-876-804) are $56 for one night; $52 for two to five nights; and $49 for six nights or more. Rates are per room, double occupancy. Stuart’s fabulous breakfasts are included, but dinners are additional.
Two helpful brochures from the Wales Tourist Board list the wide range of offbeat accommodations available in Wales. “Welsh Rarebits” and “Great Little Places” include, respectively, more than 46 inns, farms, hotels and guest houses all with 10 rooms or less, plus 89 one-of-a-kind places to stay, from a lighthouse perched on a cliff to a Tudor manor house lit by candles.
Prices at some of Wales’ smaller inns start at $56 for two people including a full Welsh breakfast.
INFORMATION
For these brochures and more information, contact the Wales Tourist Board at 800-462-2748; www.visitwales.com.
A.B./S.B.
