Conwy in North Wales is stunningly situated by any standards. On one side lies the estuary of the Conwy river while the other 3 sides are protected by 13th century town walls, over three-quarters of a mile long and guarded by no less than 22 towers, considered to be some of the finest protecting walls in the world. Apart from one small section, visitors can walk around them in their entirety.

In the town itself the principal sites are the Elizabethan mansion Plas Mawr built in 1577 and Aberconwy, a medieval town house built at the beginning of the 14th century. Those with an eye for eccentric tourist sites should visit the Smallest House in Great Britain on the quay which doesn’t seem much wider than the hat of the woman in Welsh National dress standing outside.

Conwy’s soaring castle was built at exactly the same time as the one at Harlech. Massive curtain walls and eight huge round towers gives the castle, a World Heritage Site, an intimidating presence, standing as it does on a natural clump of rock. The views from the battlements look out towards the mountains of Snowdonia and The Irish Sea. Visitors can also look down to the roofless shell of the castle’s Great Hall and Thomas Telford’s Conwy Suspension Bridge, which opened in 1826.