Europe > United Kingdom > Wales > Llanidloes
Llanidloes is a small Mid Wales market town with more pull than its size suggests. It sits where narrow roads begin to climb into the Cambrian Mountains, and where the young River Severn has only just left the hills.
The town centre has a real focal point in the Old Market Hall, a black-and-white timber-framed building standing in the middle of the street like a survivor from an older Wales. Around it are independent shops, old inns, and the kind of slow main streets that work better on foot than from a car.
The stronger reason to stop is just outside town. Llyn Clywedog brings big reservoir views, a high concrete dam, osprey habitat, and the ruins of Bryntail lead mine. West of Llanidloes, Hafren Forest has trails to cascades and to the source of the Severn on Pumlumon.
Llanidloes is not a polished heritage town pretending to be bigger than it is. Its appeal is the combination: a distinctive market-town core, textile and Chartist history, and immediate access to some of the wilder, quieter scenery of Mid Wales.