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Bargain Travel Europe guide to Europe on a budget for unusual destinations,
holiday travel tips and secret spots missed by travel tours.



UK holiday rentals from £99 per week


PORTMEIRION VILLAGE AND GARDENS
Hotel and Imagination in North Wales

Portmeirion Hotel Village and Gardens Wales photo“Who is number one?” The question was asked again and again by Patrick McGoohan’s character “Number Six” in one of the most unique and obtuse television series of the 1960’s, “The Prisoner”. McGoohan played a secret agent who upon trying to retire, is kidnapped and wakes up in a mysterious place on an unknown island called merely “The Village”, of curious colorful little cottages and tamed, subdued residents only known by numbers, where one could never leave. An escape attempt by swimming from the island’s long sandy shore would release an orange bubble to chase and capture, awaking once again in the Village. The British television series only lasted a season, but left an indelible impression, much of it the unique “village” surroundings. Where the show was a fantasy, the village was a real place. Portmeirion in North Wales.

Foauntain Portmeirion photoPortmeiron was first a hotel, opened in 1926 by a visionary architect and early conservationist, Clough Williams-Ellis. The Portmeirion Hotel was set on a tidal estuary where thick wooded slopes met sandy beach at the edge of the Snowdonia region of North Wales, south of Caernarfon. Williams-Ellis believed a town site could be developed without spoiling its natural surroundings. The creation of Portmeiron Village and Gardens, begun in the 1920’s wasn’t completed until 1976 when Clough Williams-Ellis was 90 years old. Prisoner Filiming Village photoA collection of quaint and cute buildings of their own architectural style, half-historic half-fanciful Roman and Moroccan suggestive mythological inspiration, with names like Hercules Hall and the Unicorn, nestled in the garden greenery surrounding a central square of columns and a reflecting pool. The Portmeirion Village was a fascination for the imaginative and literary long before its television appearance in 1966. George Bernard Shaw, H.G. Wells and Bertrand Russell were regular guests. Noel Coward wrote Blythe Spirit at Portmeirion during a two week stay in 1941.

Portmeirion hotel photoThe Portmeiron Village and Gardens is still primarily a hotel. Most of the buildings around the village are self-catering cottages, for short and longer stays, with two hotels on the property - the original Portmeirion Hotel on the beach and the Castle Deudraeth, a 19th Century manor house on its own grounds above the village proper. Hotel accommodations on a bed & breakfast basis and the self-catering cottages at Portmeirion can be arranged through the website, Wales Portmeirion Village photoincluding late availability. Hotel guests at Portmeirion can play golf on the nearby Porthmadog Golf Club. Accommodations can get scarce and well-booked in the summer months. Though, one doesn’t have to stay at Portmeirion to explore it’s curious setting. There are a number of shops in the village, one dedicated to the “The Prisoner” series, another to Portmeirion Pottery, (a product designed by Williams-Ellis daughter Susan and Prisoner Filmed at Portmeiron car photomanufactured in the English pottery center of Stoke-on-Trent). The buildings of the village also house a self-service cafe and ice cream parlor. There are restaurants in the hotels. Stop for lunch at the Castell Deudraeth restaurant and get free entry into the village. The Portmeirion Village and Gardens are open to non-resident visitors every day all year from 9:30 to 5:30 pm. Portmeirion Village is about two and half hours by car from Manchester or Birmingham and three and a half from Cardiff.

There are many warning signs at Portmeiron about not venturing out into the tidal estuary during the a tidal shifts when the wide sandy beaches can beckon a relaxing stroll, but quickly flood with water when the tide comes in, but you’ll find few signs around the village explaining its meaning as its designer Williams-Ellis felt it should speak for itself. You’ll also find no warnings about the orange bubbles that come after you if you try to leave. © Bargain Travel Europe

Review of Portmeirion Hotel

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Portmeirion Village

These articles are copyrighted and the sole property of Bargain Travel Europe and WLPV, LLC. and may not be copied or reprinted without permission.

SEE ALSO:

PLAS TAN YR ALLT COUNTRY HOUSE B&B

FFESTINIOG AND WELSH HIGHLAND RAILWAYS

PENTRE-MAWR SNOWDONIA BED & BREAKFAST

PRISONER LOTUS 7 - MOVIE CAR MUSEUM

CASTLE HOTEL CONWY- CASTLE VIEW ROMANCE

ST DEINIOL'S RESIDENTIAL LIBRARY