Coast Walking (Wales): Kidwelly to Llanelli 30 June 2015

We parked at Kidwelly Quay, where there was a large picnic area and good views of saltmarsh, which had a lot of black-headed gulls. Flocks of starlings wheeled around the marsh and magpies were also frequent. We walked round the edge and back to the Coast Path, where three stoats flashed across the path. (One was seen recently killed beside the road to the car park when we returned in the evening.) We left the Coast Path again to explore more saltmarsh edge before returning to it over the railway and into a road leading to the Commissioners’ Bridge roundabout on the A484. The road had to be followed for 750m until a paved cycle trail left westwards, along the southern edge of yet another military firing range. This continued for 2km through a rough marshy area, where the main birds were skylark, meadow pipit and pied wagtail. The trail then led through a large mixed woodland, Pembrey Forest, where the ground vegetation was typical of old settled dunes, with burnet rose, sea buckthorn, tufted vetch and evening primrose and, in damper places, southern marsh orchid and variegated horsetail. There was a small colony of common gromwell and we saw a dark green fritillary patrolling its home space.

Contrary to what is shown on the OS map the trail goes straight west and eventually emerges on to open dunes with sea rocket and, right at the top of the shore, saltwort. To the south, however, the dunes were entirely taken over by a forest of sea buckthorn. We went down to the huge Cefn Sidan Sands, a wide sandy beach, which we walked for 4km southwards. There were large numbers of arenicolous shells, many in excellent condition, such as large otter shells and prickly cockles. Scattered among them were washed-up jellyfish, many large dogfish, and occasional bird carcasses such as gannet and guillemot. Heart urchins were everywhere. Several boat-wrecks occurred as the remains of timbers thrusting up through the sand. Eventually we arrived below Pembrey Country Park where more holidaymakers occupied the beach, which had until then been almost empty apart from unclad men now and again at the dune’s edge. We took a path into the dunes again, past lots of gladdon in flower, burnet-rose and seaside centaury. We walked alongside the cycle trail as far as a series of large car parks showing substantial use at holiday times and weekends and eventually a small kiosk and other conveniences, including shady benches which were welcome when we had been walking exposed continually to bright sun and 27⁰ heat. We were desperate for iced-lollies before eating our dull lunch, the best we could get from the only shop, a Spar, in Kidwelly. We continued east to the end of the Country Park, the way thick with pyramidal orchids, often visited by marbled whites, and then north back to join the Coast Path that cut through the centre. We then followed a paved path below rather impoverished dunes (except for continuing pyramidal orchids) bordering a golf-course on one side and saltmarsh on the other. We found a minor path paralleling the paved path, more friendly on the feet, and allowing us to record more saltmarsh plants, including seablite, a little glasswort, and sea-lavender. Ditches with reeds had many singing reed warblers. We continued along the Coast Path into Burry Port (Porth Tywyn) and its outer harbour, where we found a café for cold drinks. The harbour was full of boats and there was substantial activity around here with people taking the unaccustomed sun (abruptly ten degrees higher than the last few weeks), and enjoying a series of sandy beaches. The peace, however, was demolished by thunderous noise of military jets performing exercises. The path continued east above relic dunes (with spiny rest-harrow) above sandy beaches, through an area planted with trees and came out again by the coast where we saw a tanker taking on oil through a large pipe resting in the sea, on which rested in turn a grey seal, which obviously found this an appropriate substitute for a rock. We continued over the railway by a new bridge (the OS map says “Tunnel”!!), surmounted by a monument to the millennium cycle track. The path then continues alongside the railway, which runs directly by the coast along an embankment. The first third of this path was uncomfortable because of a layer of rough chippings of hard sharp stone – whoever thought this was a suitable substrate for walking or cycling? We passed a nature reserve, recreation ground, water park and hundreds of people taking advantage of the wide flat paved trails to exercise on bicycles. It was a surprising seafront for industrial towns like Burry Port and Llanelli, which we were then entering, and a marvellous facility for residents, safe from all motor traffic. As the railway turned inland we crossed it by another bridge with another monument and continued along the coast, where there were again more well-populated sandy beaches. This led to a gentrified port area, North Dock, where there crowds of people at leisure after work and school. We left the trail here to go up to the station and catch a train back to Kidwelly.