Bus Routes in Wales
T12: Machynlleth to Welshpool
Every time Luke pronounces the name of a Welsh town, a Cymraeg-speaking fairy dies.
I’m more than happy getting to places in a fast and efficient manner if time is short or when treading a familiar path. That said, I generally prefer to see the back lanes, the winding estates and the obscure landmarks which you just can’t see from a train or a coach.
Fantastic towns and villages that non-drivers can’t reach by any other means: Leek, Dartmouth, Kirkby Lonsdale, Aldeburgh, Banff, Bawtry, Beer, Tideswell, Tenby, Tadcaster, Ullapool, Porthcurno, they’re all accessible by bus alone, even if there aren’t too many of them.
I’ll fully concede that hopping on a few buses isn’t going to be for everyone, but it’s not about the bus itself. It’s about the out-of-the-way, the overheard snippets of conversation, the weird and unfamiliar place names, the people you’re with, the unexpected.
This website will tell you about ace bus routes, give you ideas for days out to explore new places, and maybe even nudge you into planning some slow travel adventures of your own.
Click on the About section to learn more about how I got into all this shenanigans, and if you’d like to drop me a line, then head over to the Contact page. I will be forever indebted to Bustimes.org, which has made planning these journeys as simple as possible.
Every time Luke pronounces the name of a Welsh town, a Cymraeg-speaking fairy dies.
He alternates between sniffing up and blowing out of one of his nostrils with enough force to snuff out the candles on an octogenarian’s birthday cake.
We’re welcomed in by the crackling force of an industrial boiling water tap that only old-skool cafes, or a million scousers simultaneously saying ‘Burt Bacharach’, can replicate.
Candidates need two miraculous events to qualify for sainthood, which is quite the KPI to meet for the average nun or parish priest.
One of the old ladies has an incredible polyphonic voice. Squeaky yet gruff, she’s part way between Betty Boop and Phyllis from Coronation Street.
Slower Travel returns with a tense race to El's auntie's pub in Padfield. Who'll win, though: the train or the 393?
A fortnight after our visit, she finds a man staggering in the beer garden at 3am with a cardboard box on his head. ‘He didn’t even cut eye holes in it,’ she told the local paper. ‘I was howling.’
It’s a deconstructed, flatpack breakfast on a rectangular plate. All the ingredients are there, just not together. What a calamity.
Bagpipes are an incredible invention. I’d never think in a million years to gut a sheep, attach pipes to the holes where its neck and legs once were, and squeeze out a tune.