Llandudno, Conwy
Some British resorts are concerning the seaside. In others it’s strolling alongside the promenade. The trendy ones push gastronomy, drink, road artwork, tradition. Others follow arcades, funfairs, youngsters’ stuff. Llandudno delivers all of those and a bit extra in addition to – and it does so unpretentiously, warmly and ever so barely Welshly.
My introduction got here within the Nineteen Eighties, once we – my Lancashire household, or reasonably, households, as my divorced mum and pop took us individually to Wales – descended from our chalet or static above Abergele and hit Llandudno excessive road. There, I used to be purchased my first severe soccer equipment – Wales away, yellow with inexperienced and pink the other way up Js. The “outlets have been higher” in Llandudno. They nonetheless are, with the primary drag, Mostyn Avenue, boasting chains and independents, Victorian arcades and Clare’s division retailer – nonetheless going after nearly a century.
Llandudno was all the time busy, enjoyable, a bit bit upmarket. Maybe an innate confidence has helped it fare higher than different north Wales seaside cities. Once I went final yr, there have been coach events from Manchester and South Yorkshire. Locals – a lot of them “expats” from England – have been sunning themselves on benches. It was Might, however sweltering, and the ice-cream distributors have been scooping frantically, the chippies turning out countless trays of cod and chips. On the finish of the pier there’s a pub – an ideal thought – and the alfresco benches have been all taken.
The promenade alongside the primary seaside, referred to as the North Shore, is a sweeping great thing about wedding-cake terraces, with a large strolling and biking path operating for nearly two miles, shelters to make use of as shades or suntraps, a paddling pool and an Alice in Wonderland art trail (the actual Alice holidayed right here). Dylan’s Restaurant is put in inside the previous Washington resort, a surprising nook constructing by distinguished native architect Arthur Hewitt – additionally accountable for Llandudno’s Winter Gardens and Savoy and Palladium cinemas; the latter survives as a pub.
Llandudno is framed by two limestone headlands – the Little Orme and Nice Orme – at both finish of city. The latter, mined in prehistoric times for copper and different ores, has a cable-hauled tramway and Kashmiri goats that became famous in 2020 in the course of the pandemic, once they got here right down to the city centre on the lookout for firm, and hedges to eat. You may see the Isle of Man, Blackpool Tower and the Cumbrian fells from the highest.
West Shore, beneath the Nice Orme, is backed by dunes and feels much more pure. It has pretty sunsets and vigorous winds, drawing kite-flyers and kite-surfers.
Strolling round city, which has sloping streets and slim nooks to get misplaced in, you usually catch sight of the rocky summits of Eryri (Snowdonia). I don’t know another main resort within the UK that’s so near severe hillwalking territory.
Through the years, Llandudno has been declared the daffodil capital, startup capital and fish and chip capital of north Wales. On the high finish of the A470 – the Welsh Route 66, which begins in Cardiff – it’s arguably the area’s fundamental city centre, although Wrexham might need a factor or two to say about that. Nobody, although, disputes Llandudno’s standing because the queen of Welsh resorts.
One night, throughout my go to final yr, a sea fret descended on Llandudno Bay. I used to be strolling alongside the promenade from the pier in the direction of Craig-y-Don – a someday suburb way back subsumed by Llandudno – and the Little Orme. Joggers and scooter riders appeared like wraiths out of the dense murk. The Alice in Wonderland statues regarded spooky and misplaced. The terraces regarded gray and ghostly within the dimness. Instantly, as I progressed east, the mist beat a whole retreat, heat daylight pervading like an epiphany. Llandudno regarded completely stunning, as if reborn, or at the least rediscovered.
A part of this was little question childhood recollections flooding again. But it surely was additionally a way of being genuinely bowled over. Llandudno is a serious city and a resort, a spot to stay in addition to to vacation, a Welsh location that has all the time welcomed outsiders, and an city centre with wild edges. It has endured by sustaining traditions and maintaining. I believe it’s particular, a little bit magical.
The place to remain: St George’s is a well-preserved seafront resort courting from the Victorian period, with an ideal restaurant. Doubles from £114, B&B
Chris Moss
Folkestone, Kent
Once I cycle down Folkestone’s Earls Avenue, I can see the ocean earlier than I attain the top of the road. I flip left on to the clifftop promenade, the Leas, and the view throughout the Channel is all of the sudden expansive. This mile-long stretch is lined with Edwardian and Georgian motels and trendy flats, in a spectrum that runs from light to grandeur. Works in progress embody one other residence advanced and a Nineteen Thirties bathroom block being repurposed into a restaurant. I’ve a drone’s-eye view of the curve of new-build flats on the seaside, however choose to look throughout the water, the place the stubby silhouette of Dungeness energy station seems and disappears with the visibility.
To swim, I can head right down to Mermaid Seashore, with its simple incline into the water. The Zig Zag Path is the way in which to get there (at the least till the funicular Leas Elevate is restored in 2026). The convincing grottos of this Nineteen Twenties path have been hewn from Pulhamite: faux rock with real allure, which nonetheless fools informal guests.
Nicely-heeled Edwardians as soon as paraded on the Leas, and it’s cited as proof of Folkestone’s glory days that Edward VII frequented the Grand resort. Our French neighbours as soon as thought Folkestone a prestigious vacation vacation spot, as did many English. Booming summer time seasons might have departed with finances flights, however the previous 20 years have delivered newsworthy regeneration. The logic of the Creative Folkestone basis – one of many methods via which philanthropist Roger De Haan has pumped tens of hundreds of thousands of kilos into the native economic system – has been to make Folkestone an ideal place to stay and work, on the premise that guests will observe.
The Grand is now non-public residences, and was topped in 2014 with a Yoko Ono morse code art work. There are a number of refined up to date artworks on the Leas, and tens extra all through the city and on its seashores – from an Antony Gormley statue gazing out to sea, to Lubaina Himid’s Jelly Mould Pavilion on the boardwalk. These are the legacy of the Folkestone Triennial, Artistic Folkestone’s flagship challenge since 2008. The open-air exhibition, which returns for summer time 2025 (19 July-19 October), has helped rework the city’s fortunes, assisted by a game-changing high-speed rail hyperlink to London. To stay right here is to come across artwork, gently and infrequently. The one time I misplaced my kids for a vital size of time, they turned out to be investigating a Mark Wallinger piece.
In recent times, customer numbers have risen, as have (thornier topic) home costs. Partly, that’s right down to the thrill of the Harbour Arm, the place quirky meals and drinks distributors have repurposed prepare carriages, transport containers and even the lighthouse. I favour Sail Box, on the very tip of the arm, for the dimensions of its sea view and pancake stacks. On the town, the subsidised Creative Quarter sees unbiased companies spill down the Old High Street – the place Steep Avenue espresso provides a Parisian-inspired books-and-cakes combo – to the artists’ studios on Tontine Avenue.
Folkestone has so many issues it didn’t have 10 years in the past: the world’s first multistorey skatepark; a New York Highline-inspired backyard walkway, resulting in the revitalised Harbour Arm; an annual Pride, and LGBTQ+ bookshop; mini golf on the seaside. A Labour MP. And, as of spring 2025, a Reform-led council. So, we’ve nonetheless obtained vary.
Considered one of my favorite issues shouldn’t be new, it’s merely to linger on the seaside each time seals or porpoises are within the water. One Sunday, a pod of dolphins splashed about for half-hour in view of the place I sat with buddies and youngsters, beach-bar drinks in hand. It’s actually arduous to beat Folkestone on a sizzling day, with dolphins.
The place to remain: overlooking the harbour a brief stroll from city, the London and Paris Hotel has 11 fairly rooms, doubles from £175, room solely
Sophy Grimshaw
Scarborough, North Yorkshire
Scarborough residents discuss with guests as “comforts”, as a result of they’ve often “Come for t’ day”, reasonably than the week, as was as soon as the seaside norm. The adverse shift helps clarify why Scarborough will obtain £20m from the federal government’s Plan for Neighbourhoods, to fund vital regeneration over the following decade.
The plan is designed for “left-behind” communities. If Scarborough is left behind, it’s also majestic, what with the good sweep of the 2 bays, divided by the verdant fort headland. Most of its fundamental points of interest – which are usually commensurately large-scale – are unaffected by the present regeneration, for the reason that city has been quietly sustaining them for a long time, even centuries.
Take the place the place all of it started, not solely Scarborough tourism however seaside holidays normally. Scarborough Spa stands adjoining to a spring, whose salty waters oozing from the bottom of a cliff have been promoted as therapeutic within the early seventeenth century. The gentry got here to drink them, together with different issues. “Well being is the pretence, dissipation is the top,” wrote one 18th-century customer, and the spa was the main focus of the jollity. A storm destroyed the primary spa in 1836. Its substitute burned down in 1876, the current baroque palace arising three years later. Whereas the spa was as soon as related to dinner-jacketed palm courtroom orchestras, a extra attribute trendy bill-topper can be Tony Skingle (who “IS” Elvis). However the imaginative and prescient is constant: a night time out is improved by the proximity of the ocean.
Comparable doggedness is clear within the historical past of the close by South Cliff Elevate, opened in 1875. Again then, the facility was hydraulic. Right now, the system is totally automated, however the automobiles are nonetheless manufactured from wooden, one descending as the opposite ascends, like floating backyard sheds.
They carry passengers up via the near-vertical South Cliff Gardens, lately refurbished and underpinned. Subdivisions embody the genteel Rose Backyard, which was created in 1883 and has been rigorously tended ever since (it’s not simple to develop roses by the ocean), together with a serious restoration in 2015.
On the North Bay, Peasholm Park was opened in 1912, with an oriental theme, which (this being Scarborough) meant an Oriental Backyard surmounted by a pagoda and surrounded by a fairy-lit boating lake. Such playfulness didn’t go well with the brash Nineteen Seventies, and the park went to seed, however a programme of renewal introduced a Grade II itemizing in 1999. The narrow-gauge North Bay Railway additionally runs via gardens, and has performed since 1931, skirting the Open Air Theatre, which closed in 1986 however was triumphantly relaunched in 2010.
Now, allow us to return to the South Bay and the harbour, the place the white lighthouse has stood like a cake ornament since 1806. Nicely, kind of. The unique was destroyed by the German bombardment of 1914, its substitute erected in 1931. The harbour is attractively gritty: at low water, the pleasure boats are slumped within the mud. The youngsters with their crab strains appear to be emulating the grownup fishers, who function across the Victorian buildings of the West Pier.
The present regeneration does embody the West Pier, the place a hoarding broadcasts plans for a multimillion-pound refurbishment, “bettering facilities for native individuals and guests”. However while you ask the native individuals about this, you encounter eye rolls and darkish muttering. Their suspicion is that the pier will change into too touristy on the expense of the fishing, and the plans are on maintain for consultations. Scarborough has usually polished – reasonably than recut – the jewels in its crown, so I belief the harbour won’t be too drastically “improved”.
The place to remain: Weston Lodge on Esplanade, Scarborough’s poshest road, has doubles from £100, room solely
Andrew Martin
To the Sea By Prepare by Andrew Martin is printed by Profile Books on 31 July (£18.99). To help the Guardian, order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Supply expenses might apply
Portobello, Edinburgh
A starling skips from wall to ground to desk on the Portobello promenade, desirous to nick the parmesan from the preposterously giant slice of pizza I’ve acquired from Edinburgh establishment Civerinos. On the seaside to my proper, sunbathers battle melting ice-creams, canines disrupt seaside volleyball bouts and youngsters dig for Australia. Past, bobbing heads courageous the North Sea chill, understanding the wood-fired Soul Water Sauna is ready again on the promenade in the event that they get a bit nippy.
Portobello is a stylish spot lately. The coastal suburb of Edinburgh is simply a 30-minute bus experience from town centre, however “Porty” has its personal identification, distinct from the capital.
“I liked rising up right here,” says Michael Pedersen, Edinburgh’s makar (poet laureate). “I liked the ocean. I liked the arcade. I liked Arthur’s Seat looming within the background like a behemoth bull seal about to enter a brawl. But it surely didn’t really feel such as you have been in a stylish, stylish epicentre of a spot. It felt such as you have been on the outskirts, making an attempt to claw your method again in.”
The neon storm of Nobles – a battlement-themed penny arcade on the promenade – provides a portal to Porty’s previous. Portobello was included into Edinburgh in 1896, when it was certainly one of Scotland’s hottest seaside resorts. Low-cost tram and prepare entry introduced the plenty in from Edinburgh and Glasgow, and an open-air pool and pleasure pier awaited them. Each of these points of interest are lengthy gone – the rise of package deal holidays ending the growth – however the Victorian swimming baths (and Edinburgh’s solely Turkish baths) stay, council-run. As I backstroke underneath bunting strung throughout the pool, the solar shines via the glass roof, illuminating the columns and gallery.
It’s not nostalgia that pulls individuals to Porty at the moment, although. It’s – in addition to veggie eateries comparable to Go Go Beets and speciality espresso spot Tanifiki – the rebellious aptitude of the neighborhood and what they’ve created. In 2017, for instance, a Georgian church on the town was attributable to be bought off. Luxurious flats beckoned, however native marketing campaign group Action Porty intervened and led a uncommon city neighborhood buyout. It’s now Bellfield – residence to a neighborhood cafe, artwork courses and ceilidhs.
“After we moved right here within the Nineties, Portobello was very down-at-heel,” says Justin Kenrick, chair of Motion Porty, as we stroll the promenade. “Newspapers known as it harmful. What we’re making an attempt to struggle off now’s the place turning into one huge vacation let. If there’s no neighborhood, there’s no level.”
The town hall was additionally saved by the neighborhood. It hosts common occasions, comparable to Porty Pride’s annual ball, high Scottish comedians and sold-out showcases from Edinburgh’s Discovery Wrestling.
The principle draw for a lot of guests is The Portobello Bookshop, a beloved indie with Corinthian columns. “You see individuals actually warming to something anyone does that’s enhancing the neighborhood,” proprietor Jack Clark tells me. Their distinctive occasions programme has introduced in authors from Eimear McBride to Zadie Smith. Pedersen packed out the bookshop in Might to launch his debut novel Muckle Flugga, glimmers of which have been impressed by his residence city.
Pedersen has seen the Portobello skyline demolished and rebuilt since his childhood. “It’s so necessary, as unbiased companies get profitable and the realm turns into extra prosperous, to spend money on neighborhood teams,” the poet says. “The truth that there are these buildings coming again into neighborhood leases and fingers retains a lot of the integrity of the realm.
“I like Portobello in all its foibles and flaws; all its chintzy glamour; all its new-wave chicness.”
Stroll alongside the promenade, trying throughout the Firth of Forth to Fife, and it’s simple to see why.
The place to remain: Straven Guesthouse is a conventional, family-run place near the promenade, doubles from £107, B&B (minimal two nights)
Stuart Kenny
