While this doesn't come across as the most arresting image, it, for me, holds a feeling that was persistent throughout today. The smooth, winding road, dappled sunlight on along the walls, fresh foliage, and in the distance, the sea of the Menai Straights, rushing by the shore.

My second day off, and my second day out with a group from work. This time, however, I only spent the coach journey with them - to Beaumaris, where they were looking round the 'Gaol' and the courthouse.

Beaumaris is on the Isle of Anglesey, and is always sunnier than the rest of North Wales. Up until now, I had also not had the oppertunity to explore it on my own, having only gone to the lighthouse at Penmon Point to do 'rocky shore' ecology days with groups.

As the school trudged off to the old courthouse and jail, I walked though teh sunny streets to a coffee shop, and bought a paper, sat on the pier and watched the clouds sweep over the mountains of Snowdonia. A fresh dusting of snow could be seen on the tops, quite a surprise so late in the season. These clouds eventually came over to Anglesey, and before the rain started I had a look around the old jail, seeing as I could save the fiver or so as I was with a school group.

The Jail is very impressive, and reminds one of a period of 'justice' quite unlike any that I myself associated with the Brittish. Horrible, squalled conditions, a human powered water wheel from which you would climb an 'ever-rising staircase' or fall and be crushed in the workings below, for 8 hours a day. Children alike would be punished, and children born in the prison would stay in the prison - in a cot that could be rocked via a rope to the womans room below.

After the Jail I caught a lift with the school to Menai Bridge, and jumped off to explore around, and find my own way back to Betws-y-coed. Bronwen, one of the tutors, went to university in nearby Bangor, so could give me some very sound advice on places to stroll around. She directed me to Church Island, which sits on a causeway in the Menai Straights, with views to both of the bridges.

I sat here in the sun - which was now beaming down from a cloudless sky - read more of the paper, and watched the sailing boats, canoes and kayaks make their way past.

After a look at a map, I decided to walk to Bangor, along the straight. After re-fueling from the only Waitrose in North Wales (joked as Prince William lives near, how else would it get planning?), and a quick poke about the town of Menai Bridge, I walked over the bridge itself, and with that, back onto the mainland of Great Britain.

The walk to Bangor was lovely - along the shore, through bluebell woods, and all the while with the sun beating down, and the gurgle of the water as it ran down the channel between the mainland and Anglesey. The flow from the tide here can be as fast as 6 mph, and a boat that had made unfortunate timing was only just making headway against the current.

I didn't have much time at Bangor, as the last train that would get me home at any reasonable time left early, but I still almost managed to miss it, loosing track of time... Sitting in the sun overlooking the sea, the bay, time slipped by unnoticed.

Train to Conwy, where I got off for an hour, enjoyed an ice-cream by the harbour, before walking across the bridge to catch the train from Llandudno Junction back home. The coast all this time had been swathed in sun, but the mountains had held on fast to their blanket of cloud, and as I got out of the train, it began to spit with rain.