Gower, or the Gower Peninsular is located in south west Wales and extends into the Bristol Channel for about 19 miles, just past Swansea.
With its incredible beaches, cliffs and woodlands Gower was the first place in the UK to be designated an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in 1956.
Chris and I had two reasons for visiting:
- We were spending a week in Pembrokeshire and wanted to find somewhere different to explore
- We had decided to leave home at 4:30 am to drive to Wales and miss the traffic!
Having never been there, Gower seemed the perfect place to stop for a short detour and make the most of the first day of our holiday. I had previously researched ‘best beaches in Gower’ and Three Cliffs Bay was one of them!
With such an early start it was a pleasure to drive along the M25 and the M4 on a Saturday morning with very little traffic! We were crossing the River Severn and were entering Wales before 8 am. With a couple of coffee stops and swapping the driving between us on the way we arrived at the Gower Heritage Centre at 9:30 am.
There are three main places to park in order to visit Three Cliffs Bay which are very close to each other and all about a mile from the beach. We parked at the Gower Heritage Centre and paid £4 for the day and you can also park next to a place called Shepherds or in a field across the road.
The Gower Heritage Centre didn’t open until 10 am and while there is an honesty box to pay for your parking we decided to sit on a picnic bench and have yet another coffee while we waited for it to open in order to purchase our car park ticket. There is a lovely bakery next to the car park too which is handy for picking up food supplies if you need them for the beach.
Getting to Three Cliffs Bay
From the Heritage Centre, you walk past the bakery and soon arrive at Shepherds. From there you cross the road (there the field car park is located), walk to the right of that and take the right hand path through woodland towards the beach.
The woodland soon opens out into a soft sandy path which is actually quite difficult to walk on! To the left of the photo above on the top of the hill there is the ruins of a castle.
Continue along the grassy path…
You continue to follow the path to the left of the small estuary towards the beach.
After a mile of walking from the car park, you reach the large sandy beach. The above photo shows why this is called Three Cliffs Bay!
We walked to the far right of the beach and found a lovely peaceful spot to enjoy our picnic brunch. Having had such an easy and stress-free drive to Wales, followed by a mile walk to stretch our legs it was perfect to sit on our towels with our backs against a smooth rock and relax in the warm sun. And the view wasn’t bad either!
Chris had his swimming shorts with him and considered a swim in the warm shallow sea until I spotted a ginormous jellyfish which was about half a meter wide! The biggest jellyfish I had seen in my life! We also found afterwards that due to strong currents people are advised against swimming and water sports on this beach.
Having decided not to swim or even paddle in the sea we soon became bored of sitting on the beach and began to make our way towards the castle.
Panoramic views of the beach opened up as we walked up towards the castle ruins.
Bit of a climb in the heat!
Pennard Castle was built by the Normans in the early 12th century and is a grade 2 listed building.
From the castle we walked back towards the car park. There wasn’t much in the way of signposts and we ended up walking on the edge of Pennard Golf course! With the help of Google Maps we found our way back to the wooded footpath and the car.
Summary
A fab little stop over and highly recommended if you are visiting Gower or South Wales!
frombluetogreen.com 
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