Things to do in Flintshire

Castell Caergwrle is one of Cadw’s most recent acquisitions through Guardianship, although the wider site remains in the ownership of Hope Community Council. Built between 1278–82 by Dafydd ap Gruffudd (d. 1283), brother of Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, on lands given to him by Edward I and taken from Powys, it was the last castle to be built by a native Welsh prince. The castle provided the base for Dafydd’s attack on the English garrison at Hawarden in 1282, which sparked Edward’s second Welsh campaign. Work on the castle continued under the Crown, but it was probably incomplete when it was abandoned after a fire and was ruinous by 1335. There is a waymarked path from the junction of Wrexham Road and Castle Street in the centre of the village. A five-year programme of improvement to the wider castle grounds has been agreed with the community council and is being delivered by Flintshire Countryside Services.

The city walls of Chester are the most complete surviving example of Roman and medieval city walls in Britain, a nearly continuous circuit of approximately three kilometres that follows the line of the original Roman fortress wall built in the first century AD and has been maintained, repaired and rebuilt in every century since. Walking the full circuit of the walls on the raised wall walk provides an exceptional perspective on the Roman origins of Chester, the medieval development of the city and the architecture of successive periods visible both inside and outside the wall circuit. Chester was established as the legionary fortress of Deva Victrix, headquarters of the Twentieth Legion, in the first century AD, and the Roman wall formed the perimeter of a fortress designed to house five thousand troops and control the estuary of the River Dee and the approaches to Wales. The characteristic rectangular plan of the Roman fortress is still recognisable in the street pattern of the city centre, and sections of the original Roman wall masonry are visible in the lower courses of several sections of the surviving walls. The medieval development of the walls extended their circuit to include the area of the Roman civilian settlement that had grown up outside the fortress, and the towers and gates added in the medieval period provide the most dramatic features of the current wall walk. The Eastgate Clock, added in 1899 to celebrate Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee, has become the symbol of Chester and the most photographed feature of the walls. The Northgate leads to the site of the Roman amphitheatre, the largest Roman amphitheatre yet found in Britain, partially excavated and displayed beside the wall. The raised walkway provides views over the black and white timber-framed buildings of the city centre, the cathedral close and the Rows, Chester's unique medieval covered shopping galleries, creating an urban perspective available nowhere else in England.

Chester Zoo is the most visited wildlife attraction in Britain outside London and one of the finest zoos in Europe, covering approximately 125 acres and housing over 35,000 animals representing some 500 species in naturalistic habitats that represent some of the best zoo exhibit design in the world. The zoo was founded in 1931 by George Mottershead, who was refused entry to a zoo as a child for wearing clogs and resolved to build a zoo without bars where all visitors would be welcome, and that founding philosophy of openness and accessibility has shaped the zoo's development across nine decades of continuous growth and improvement. The zoo's approach to exhibit design has been consistently innovative. The Islands development, which recreated six habitats from the islands of Southeast Asia, won widespread acclaim when it opened in 2015 and demonstrated that zoological gardens can create immersive natural environments that benefit both the animals and the visitor experience. The Monsoon Forest, a tropical rainforest habitat housing Asian elephants in a climate-controlled environment that replicates the humidity and temperature of their natural range, opened in 2019 and represented a capital investment of extraordinary scale. Chester Zoo's conservation work extends well beyond its boundaries. The zoo contributes to the European Endangered Species Breeding Programme for numerous species and manages field conservation projects in Asia, Africa and Latin America. The zoo's research into reproductive biology, nutrition and veterinary care for captive species has made contributions to conservation knowledge that benefit wild populations as well as those in human care. The Orangutan programme has been particularly significant, with Chester having been a major contributor to the captive breeding and research that supports conservation of this critically endangered species. The zoo's position near the historic city of Chester allows visitors to combine a zoo visit with the Roman walls, the medieval cathedral and the unique black and white architecture of the city.

Native-built castle in an unconventional forest setting Though it bears the distinctive features of many of Wales’s native-built castles, Ewloe’s location marks it out as an individual. While the Welsh princes generally chose lofty vantage points for their fortresses, Ewloe sits in a hollow amid deep woodland. The setting may seem idyllic today, but these borderlands were once hotly contested territory where the English and Welsh frequently clashed. Due to the lack of records from the period, the castle’s history is a little murky. The characteristically Welsh D-shaped stone tower was probably built by Llywelyn ap Iorwerth (Llywelyn the Great) some time after 1210, with the curtain walls and circular western tower being added by Llywelyn ap Gruffydd (Llywelyn the Last) nearly 60 years later.

The first of Edward I's 'Iron Ring',construction of the castle began around 1277. Besieged by the Welsh in 1282 and 1294 the castle was set on fire to prevent its capture although it was later repaired and partly rebuilt. Richard I was held at the castle in 1399 and it was slighted by the Parliamentarians after they captured it from the Royalists in 1647.

Origins date back to the Iron Age, a Norman castle was reportedly both destroyed and replaced during the 13th century. Dafydd ap Gruffudd attacked the castle in 1282 and he was executed by Edward I in 1283. Following the English Civil War Oliver Cromwell ordered the castle slighted in the 17th century.

Moel Famau is the highest summit in the Clwydian Range, rising to 555 metres above sea level in northeast Wales within the Clwydian Range and Dee Valley Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The mountain is one of the most popular walking destinations in North Wales and provides some of the finest panoramic views available anywhere in northeast Wales, taking in Snowdonia, the Cheshire Plain, the Mersey estuary, the Liverpool skyline and on exceptionally clear days the Lake District fells across the water. The summit is crowned by the remains of the Jubilee Tower, a monument commissioned to celebrate the Golden Jubilee of King George III in 1810 but never completed as designed due to funding shortfalls and the subsequent death of the king. The truncated stump that stands today is a fraction of the intended structure, which was planned as an obelisk of considerable height, but it has become an integral part of the mountain's character and provides a useful landmark for orientating the panoramic view. The mountain forms part of Offa's Dyke, the earthwork boundary constructed in the eighth century AD by the Mercian king Offa to delineate the border between his kingdom and the Welsh kingdoms to the west. Sections of the original dyke earthwork are visible in the surrounding landscape, and the Offa's Dyke Path National Trail passes along the ridgeline of the Clwydian Range, of which Moel Famau forms the centrepiece. Walking the ridge section between Bodfari and Llandegla, with Moel Famau at its highest point, is one of the classic day walks in northeast Wales. The heather moorland on the upper slopes of Moel Famau provides habitat for red grouse, merlin and skylarks, while the lower wooded slopes and the deciduous woodland in the valleys below the hill support a rich variety of woodland birds. The Moel Famau Country Park managed by Natural Resources Wales provides car parking, waymarked trails and picnic facilities that make the mountain accessible to families and walkers of all abilities. The approach from Cilcain to the west and from the Bwlch Penbarra car park directly below the summit are the two most popular routes, the latter being a relatively short climb suitable for families in reasonable health.

The Perch Rock Lighthouse and Battery at New Brighton on the Wirral Peninsula stands at the mouth of the River Mersey, guarding the northern approach to the port of Liverpool from a sandstone outcrop that has been a hazard to shipping since vessels first used the river. The lighthouse, built in 1830 to replace an earlier wooden structure, is one of the few remaining examples of a traditional lighthouse still standing at the mouth of a major British port and has become an iconic feature of the Mersey estuary landscape, its white-painted tower visible for miles from the Merseyside coast and the passing vessel traffic. The fort adjacent to the lighthouse was built at the same time in response to concerns about the defensibility of Liverpool against naval attack, its guns intended to control access to the river. The fort never saw action in earnest but remained in military use through both World Wars, its heavy artillery and coastal defence facilities updated to meet successive generations of threat. Today the fort and lighthouse form a visitor attraction that provides access to the interior of both structures and tells the story of the port's defences and navigation aids across nearly two centuries. New Brighton itself was developed as a seaside resort from the 1830s, its position at the northern tip of the Wirral Peninsula giving it beaches facing the open Irish Sea to the north and fine views across the Mersey to the Liverpool waterfront to the south. The resort reached its peak of popularity in the Victorian and Edwardian periods when it attracted day trippers from Liverpool and beyond, and though much of the Victorian entertainment infrastructure has been lost, the waterfront and beaches retain considerable character. The views across the Mersey from the lighthouse toward the Liverpool waterfront, with its distinctive skyline of the Three Graces and the modern buildings of the commercial waterfront, are among the finest available of this internationally recognised cityscape.