What a Gift!

This is the author, sitting in the Ship Inn at Traeth Coch, Anglesey, Wales, UK. What you don't see is the glass of Pinot Noir which tasted wondeful! The Ship Inn is a very popular watering hole which also serves excellent food in its restaurant or as bar snacks. The views from the inn are superb with a vista taking in the headland at Llanddona, the island of Ynys Seriol with all its seabirds, and in the distance you can see the Great Orme peninsular at Llandudno.

Pauline and I love to go for walks by the sea on our beautiful island. There are so many footpaths round the coast and beaches to stroll along. The beauty of the island is forever with you, whatever you are doing or wherever you are going. A trip to the supermarket involves a country drive! I am looking out from my study right now and gazing at a beautiful blue sky. All around are rolling fields of sheep and cattle. Agriculture is a major employer on the island. Perhaps the only scars are the nuclear power station at Wylfa Head and the smoking stack of Anglesey Alluminium. Yet they are the two major single employers in Anglesey, so we need them very much.

There are two bridges leading from Bangor on the mainland to the island. Prior to Christmas we experienced ten months of the Menai Suspension Bridge being used on an alternating one-way system during the first re-painting for sixty years, so that the Britannia Bridge was heavily congested. It is a salutory reminder that we rely on those bridges being there as we need our mainland links. The two bridges span the Menai Strait which is itself a beautiful waterway. Driving along it is one of the pleasures we can enjoy. The older bridge is the suspension bridge, built by Thomas Telford, and the largest suspension bridge in the world when constructed. It has two narrow single lanes in each direction and when you see a bus or lorry passing through the arches at each end you think they will never make it. There are only inches to spare. The Britannia Bridge was originally built as a tubular bridge by Robert Stephenson to take the railway over to Holyhead for sailing links with Ireland. There were two square tubes carrying the railway over to Anglesey but these were destroyed by fire. For quite a period there was no rail link to Anglesey and buses ferried passengers from Bangor to the train which had been marooned on the island when the fire broke out. When the bridge reopened it had been strengthened by a huge steel arch beneath the rail deck and a road deck had been built over the railway.

Before the bridges there were two ferries operating across the strait. These bacame redundant when the suspension bridge opened. In the old days cattle drovers actually waded across from Anglesey at low tide, taking their cattle to market. On the Bangor side there is a renovated pier which juts out into the water. Beaumaris on Anglesey also boasts a small pier from where boats sail to take passengers round Ynys Seriol and to other places of interest. Beaumaris also boasts a castle, an ancient courthouse and a jail. People used to travel miles to witness an execution outside the old jail.

This and much, much more is to be found on our lovely island which has changed very little over the years. We thank God for gifts like this. To be surrounded by all this beauty is a great privilege and one that is God given. No more do we experience the daily stress of town and city living. When we think of God as creator we no longer think he did it in six days but that it evolved over many centuries. But we need to remind ourselves that God is behind it all. At weekends and during the summer many people visit Anglesey to experience the life we residents have all the time. It is something beautiful that can be shared by those who appreciate it. God gave it to us and we are very lucky indeed.