Usk & Wye Valley
Great for...
There’s a variety of reasons why you should visit Usk and the Wye Valley. For sporting enthusiasts you have championship golf at Celtic Manor Resort, walking and hiking the three peaks surrounding Abergavenny including Sugar Loaf, kayaking down the river Wye from Monmouth and mountain biking in the Black Mountains. This region is also well known for its food culture with it being the home of the very popular Abergavenny Food Festival which pulls in crowds of people every September to see top celebrity chefs such as Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Jamie Oliver and Monica Galetti cook up some delicious dishes. One of Wales’s most prestigious festivals, held – appropriately – in Hay on Wye, the borderland ‘town of books’. Bill Clinton famously dubbed it the ‘Woodstock of the Mind’. An event with laid back party atmosphere that’s serious, funny, entertaining – and always stimulating. It’s not just about books, its 900 plus events cover everything from music to comedy, science and current affairs.
Our Take...
Take a tour of Tintern Abbey, only the second Cistercian foundation in Britain, and the first in Wales. The present-day remains are a mixture of building works covering a 400-year period between 1131 and 1536. Very little remains of the first buildings but you will marvel at the vast windows and later decorative details displayed in the walls, doorways and soaring archways.
