It won’t come as a surprise to you to learn that Wales is one of the strangest countries in the world. And it is official – paranormal investigators say so. We are surrounded by the unexplained. The message is clear. If you want to be puzzled and bewildered then come to Wales. The place is rammed with haunting, mysteries and oddness. There are ghosts everywhere. You can’t move without bumping into an exorcist on a mission it seems.
Plas Teg near Mold might be an important Jacobean house but it is also regarded as the most haunted house in Wales. It is very popular with paranormal groups who are keen to scare themselves witless on an overnight vigil. Its rival is The Skirrid Mountain Inn. It appears to be full of ghosts kicking up a fuss because they can’t get served. The first floor once served as a court and they say that the condemned were hanged from a beam over the stairwell. It is supposed to be haunted as a result, though people have always had strange experiences and visions in pubs, especially as the evening wears on.
Want to watch fairies dancing? Who doesn’t? So get up to North Wales, though it might be explained by imaginative developments in the training programmes of some rugby clubs.
If that particular flight of fancy doesn’t do much for you, then consider UFO spotting in St. Bride’s Bay in Pembrokeshire. Some nights it is like the M4 in Newport on a Friday night apparently. And before you scoff and say “pigs might fly,” let me tell you that in 1905 a “dark object with four legs and short wings” was seen over Froncysyllte in North Wales.
That is not the only odd creature here in Wales. Even if you dismiss all the Big Cat sightings as nothing more than a quick glimpse of the local tabby on his way back from the gym, consider LakeBala, or Lyn Tegid, as it is in Welsh. You’ve got the gwyniad, a species of fish trapped there since the last ice age and the rare mollusc The Glutinous snail. He isn’t trapped, he just has never travelled far, obviously. But there is also the legendary monster known as Teggie, our very own version of the Loch Ness Monster. It is said to be 8 feet long and humpbacked but it is hard to be sure since it is so shy. Teggie doesn’t surface too often and never when there is a quality camera ready to go on the shore.
And I haven’t even mentioned ghost ships, ghost armies, wandering Roman centurions, big black dogs. The list goes on and on.
So you see, we are not only towards the top of the rain league but of the weirdness league too.
It gives you a warm glow, doesn’t it?
Unlike our weather.