I regularly walk my dog on ?Dog mountain? near where I live and last year I met another dog walker and we often used to have a chat when we met.. We found out that we were both born in Llandudno and shared an interest in family research. Roy said that he would like to revisit his home on the Great Orme but as he has mobility problems I offered to drive him around the area, but for one reason or another we never did visit the Great Orme, that was until this Saturday. We met by chance again on Dog Mountain and because the weather was so good we decided to go for it.
It wasn't a walk as such but I drove to Old Road first of all, then on to St Beuno's Road, then to the Pink Farm before visiting St Tudno's Church.
I managed to park my car by the King's Head pub and walked uphill for a short distance. What a lot of visitors don't know is that in the early 1800's Llandudno was just a small village built manly on the lower slopes of the Great Orme and it had a population of only 1131 in 1851. The visitors also walk past and admire the quaint old cottages but know little about the history of the buildings. The first cottage on the right after the King's Head is Ty Newydd, now a holiday rental cottage but that is where Roy was born. It was built in about 1817 and was then a new house as the name Ty Newydd suggests. According to the chronicles of Thomas Rowlands in the mid 1800's it was the home of aged widower William Jones and Siop Ty Newydd was run by David Williams and his sister Jane selling drapery and groceries.
Above Ty Newydd is Greenhill which operated two shops . Ann Jones opened Llandudno's first Post Office there in 1838 which was in a small shed by the side of the house. Roy also told me that his Taid David Owen who played for Llandudno FC lived there and related a story about his Taid and the legendary Everton Footballer Dixie Dean. Dixie and David were best mates and Dixie once came over to stay at the cottage and they both went out that night for a drink. It must have been one heavy drinking session because they hadn't returned by midnight so Roy's Nain locked the cottage door. When she opened the door in the morning there they both were fast asleep and still drunk from the night before!
After looking around we got back in the car and I drove up to St Beuno's Road and parked the car so we could have a look around. The views from some of the properties are spectacular with stunning views of both Ormes and the Bay For anyone unfamiliar with the road, it's only a small road with nice terraced cottages and it had a Church and a Chapel at one time but both have been converted into nice family homes. We headed to Baron Hill where Roy's relations once lived but it's now two holiday cottages called Ty Mawr and Ty Bach. By coincidence one of our forum member's family once lived there in the early 1900's. I don't think that Karen would mind if I said that her ancestor Robert Hughes was fined thirty shillings for hitting a Police Officer and the judge said failure to pay would result in a months hard labour in prison!
We had our lunch in the car and then drove to the Pink Farm where another of his ancestors, the Owen family once lived, The farm once sold alcohol as Cambrian has told us and I can even remember when it sold other refreshments. You can just make out the words Teas on the slate roof of the farm
Then it was on to St Tudno's Church where Roy showed me the family grave where his relations the Jones' and the Owen's are buried.
We had a good look around and finished a nice day out with a coffee at the Beach Cafe on the West Shore.
