Caernarfon Castle - on our way to Yorkshire

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Having spent a few days in Anglesey, we moved on to our next week in Yorkshire. On the way, we stopped at Caernarfon Castle and spent some time exploring.


The site of this great castle wasn’t chosen by accident. It had previously been the location of a Norman motte and bailey castle and before that a Roman fort stood nearby. The lure of water and easy access to the sea made the banks of the River Seiont an ideal spot for Edward’s monster in masonry. 


The River Seiont is the great river that serves as a channel where many can enjoy paddling, a riverbank picnic and other family activities. Generally accessed from the town of Caernarfon, this river referred to locally as Afon Seiont and flows northward towards the Menai Strait 


Edward wasn’t one to miss on an opportunity to tighten his grip even further on the native population. The birth of his son, the first English Prince of Wales, in the castle in 1284, was a perfect device to stamp his supremacy. In 1969 the current Prince of Wales, HRH Prince Charles’s investiture took place here.


Most castles are happy with round towers, not Caernarfon! Polygonal towers were the order of the day, with the Eagle Tower being the most impressive of these. You will also note the colour-coded stones carefully arranged in bands. 


A brute of a fortress. Caernarfon Castle’s pumped-up appearance is unashamedly muscle-bound and intimidating. Picking a fight with this massive structure would have been a daunting prospect. By throwing his weight around in stone, King Edward I created what is surely one of the most impressive of Wales’s castles.


The Aber Suspension, Swing Bridge, is a pedestrian bridge across the River Seiont between the Watergate entrance to Caernarfon Castle and the Aber Foreshore. The current swing bridge was built in 1970.



Location: Castle Ditch, Caernarfon LL55 2AY, UK

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