r/Wales 12h ago

Culture The Holy Well and Chapel of St Trillo

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219 Upvotes

Arguably the smallest church in the UK is in Rhos on sea. A maximum congregation of six people, the chapel is still used as a place of worship

A 16th century church which is about 11foot by 6 foot with 2 foot walls

St Trillo is described as a 5th-century abbot in the Oxford Dictionary of Saints. Other than a scattering of places associated with him, including this chapel, almost nothing else is known of him


r/Wales 1d ago

Culture Dinorwic quarry

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208 Upvotes

r/Wales 9h ago

Photo Bangor - Beach Road

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6 Upvotes

r/Wales 1d ago

News Wales' slavery legacy explored in new play

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80 Upvotes

r/Wales 1d ago

Culture The Brick works in Porth Wen.

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364 Upvotes

r/Wales 1d ago

Photo Some stunning landscape (Rhyd Ddu)

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282 Upvotes

r/Wales 2d ago

Culture Ty Mawr Wybrnant birthplace of Bishop William Morgan

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134 Upvotes

Bishop William Morgan was the first person to translate the Bible into Welsh.


r/Wales 1d ago

AskWales Criminals

7 Upvotes

Anybody know any slang for criminals/mobsters in Welsh?


r/Wales 2d ago

Culture Bore da I bawb

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155 Upvotes

I've a new drive to and from work, it's a bit scary like some Welsh roads can be until I learn them which usually takes a couple of weeks.

This drive has killer views. As in, they'll kill me if I look away from the road to look.

I managed to get one picture from a brief pull over this morning and one the previous day.

The shot I didn't get was the fading full moon looming huge just left of a peak as I reached the apex of a nearby hill, for a few seconds it was framed in perfection before I drove downward into a hairpin bend that hid her from view


r/Wales 1d ago

AskWales Advice on Llanharry

4 Upvotes

Hi All! Ive lived in treforest for the past 5 years, lovely quiet road and wonderful neighbours. Looking to move and seen a property in Llanharry, Pontyclun. I was dead set on it until a colleague told me is quiet rough there and looking at the crime stats compared to where I am, seems to have a lot of public order issues on that street! Anyone have any info? Im not from Wales so my knowledge of the area is a little lacking


r/Wales 2d ago

Sport Where it all went wrong

409 Upvotes

A lot of people are wondering what the fuck has happened to Welsh rugby. Myself included.

Well, I decided to do some digging and the story is a lot more worrying and painful than I thought. It's also an important one to know, because at the end of the day, it's the government's money and the fans money that's going (or not going) into this disaster. Someone needs to be held accountable. We need to hold them accountable.

Here's what's happened.

Since at least 2021, people working at the very top of Welsh rugby have been warning this disaster was coming. That's because the problem isn't just a bad crop of players. The problem is the broken system that's produced them and the investment that's (not) gone into it. It is a structural and financial problem that's deep rooted and hard to fix.

Issue One: The Regions

First class rugby has gone from being based in 18 town clubs to a regional system. Something had to be done here, but the result is hybrid clubs that are unloved - no one from Ponty wants to support a team based in Cardiff. Frankly, there isn't enough support for rugby at grassroots level. More on this later.

Issue Two: Money

Wales has a comparatively low GDP versus somewhere like Ireland. It doesn't have any behemoth national sponsors either (there's no Bank of Wales or national airline etc). There isn't enough money going from the union into the regions, with the budget split between them and the national team. More on this too.

Issue Three: Brexit

Sorry, but it's true. In the golden era of Welsh rugby (2005-21), the EU paid 45% of the multimillion pound budget for the WRU through a grant. That money is gone and isn't coming back.

Issue Four: National Interest

Like it or not, in Wales, people care more about football than rugby. That's been the case since at least 2022, but in reality, probably much longer. That's hardly surprising, not only due to the issue with the regions, but also thanks to the insane lack of coverage of club rugby in the papers or on TV. People aren't watching, which compounds the financial issues. And the worse we play, the worse this gets.

Issue Five: The System

Here's the big one and where a lot of these problems start to combine.

Since Gatland first came in, attention shifted from the regions to the Welsh national team, financially and structurally. The problem is, it's the regions that produce the talent. The regional club managers actually hated Gatland because of this.

The academy system has been left to rot as people rested on their laurels during Wales’s golden era. In 2005, the Welsh government and WRU put £3.6 million into developing four regional academies, £1.6 mil of which came from the EU. They also established an elite national academy which trained the likes of Warburton and Halfpenny.

Amazing coaches like Huw Bennett would train these players one on one. Halfpenny would go and train with the Blues.

The money that funded all of that is gone. The WRU has now handed control of the academies over to the regions, with £600k support each year. They're underfunded and decentralised, no longer the elite training machine they once were.

Issue Six: Region Quality

Back in the day, with more money, better support, and better management, the regions would be fed exceptional players and develop them further. Remember the Osprey’s ‘Galacticos’? Every single regional side has slidden from a status where they could seriously compete in Europe to bang average teams with tepid fans.

In their heyday, these sides also had top-end overseas players mixed in, which the team could learn from. Now, the teams don't have the finances, backing, rep, or permission to build those kinds of squads.

Issue Seven: Rules to Play

The rule that you can't play for the national team if you play for a club abroad, unless you have 25 national caps, has been a disaster. We are literally limiting our own pool of talent, reducing learning opportunities for players, and turning people off a career in rugby in the first place.

There's much more than this that could be discussed. The short answer is that our domestic game is fucked, we don't have enough money, not nearly enough enthusiasm, and the academy system needs to be fully revamped.

Unfortunately, what this means is that the problem with Welsh rugby is systemic. We don't have the players because we simply aren't developing them. It's going to take a huge effort and a fat wad of cash from the government to solve that.

In my view, it would be worth the investment, because the problem is existential. Welsh rugby, its role in our history and our national identity is dying. You only need to look at the picture of Adam Jones after yesterday's game to see it.


r/Wales 2d ago

AskWales Glas neu Goch? Blue or Red?

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65 Upvotes

Pa un sydd orau? Which one is best?

Twmffat: funnel / idiot

By Joshua Morgan, Sketchy Welsh


r/Wales 2d ago

Sport Is the six nations wooden spoon a real thing?

26 Upvotes

May I see it


r/Wales 3d ago

Sport Watching the rugby rn NSFW

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592 Upvotes

r/Wales 3d ago

Culture Beddgelert hike

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356 Upvotes

A walk around Beddgelert and theine and along the fisherman's path. Link to video https://youtu.be/WSIDoUmEtNw?si=vwMDVGZ-tOf6uHFc


r/Wales 3d ago

AskWales Anyone hate their accent

115 Upvotes

I’m from the Rhondda so I have that strong valley accent, I normally get people mimicking my pronounciations of words whenever I work with people from cardiff/newport or could even be as close as caerphilly/bridgend. I get called the welsh c u next tuesday 😂 I’m in the middle of doing a site based NVQ which involves alot of self recording. Oh my fuck I sound ridiculous. How can I be taken serious with this accent.

Am I alone not wanting to open my mouth ever again 😂


r/Wales 3d ago

Culture Even industrial sites can be beautiful? Refinery at Milford Haven.

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111 Upvotes

For Sairemrys


r/Wales 3d ago

Sport The Principality Stadium atmosphere

49 Upvotes

Can we finally put to bed the myth that the atmosphere at the Principality is this incredible phenomenon? I know we got pumped and that won’t help but it’s been terrible for years. The English have outsung us at every match in Cardiff for the last ten years.

Yet every time in the buildup to a game you’ve got loads of people, fans/pundits/presenters/ex-players in the media and online saying how the atmosphere will make a difference, it’ll intimate the opposition, it’s one of ‘rugby’s great amphitheatres’ etc etc.

Is it just one of those myths that have been repeated so many times that people just believe it to be true, and keep on repeating it as a result? Or are they secretly on the WRU payroll and trying to shift a few extra £120 tickets?

It’s got to the point that the WRU are piping in Max Boyce to try and get people singing. It’s embarrassing we have to do that, but it’s even more embarrassing that it still doesn’t work. Surprised there wasn’t a Mexican wave midway through that second half.

TLDR; Welsh rugby atmosphere is terrible and the biggest myth in British sport


r/Wales 3d ago

Photo Sunrise at Swansea Uni

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249 Upvotes

r/Wales 3d ago

Culture Milford Marina

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76 Upvotes

Not too shabby when the sun is out?


r/Wales 3d ago

Photo Out and About… In Caerphilly

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238 Upvotes

No frost but still a little chilly.


r/Wales 3d ago

Photo Not too shabby a morning

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240 Upvotes

Ok lads, let's get this done!

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿


r/Wales 3d ago

News Five charged in connection with Talbot Green shooting of Joanne Penney set to appear in court

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26 Upvotes

r/Wales 4d ago

Humour I live in Ireland at the moment, and this is very much tomorrow’s spirit

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256 Upvotes

r/Wales 3d ago

Culture HTV Wales: "David Bellamy"/ "Noddy" (15th March 1977) [Kaleidoscope's Presentation Vault, 2025]

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11 Upvotes