Wales, my homeland, it's a beautiful place to visit and home to many haunted locations and these are the ones I've visited and boy these locations are just stunning! A lot of information is here on my blog today is taken from local stories and information from Visit Wales the Welsh tourism website.
I admit there's not a lot with this list, but this is from my memory and I will give you some background of the places and ghost stories involved with the places so come with me for a ghost story before going to sleep. :)
CASTELL COCH, Tongwynlais
There are castles all over the United Kingdom, and most of them are pretty scary, regardless of whether they have a history of paranormal activity or not. Castell Coch, however, is unique in two ways. Firstly, the division between this world and the next seems to be particularly thin as ghostly goings-on are regularly reported. Castell Coch is a relatively new building when compared to other castles, yet it’s widely regarded as one of the most haunted places in South Wales. Castell Coch was built on 13th Century ruins in 1870, meaning it is just a couple of decades more than 100 years old. It was designed by architect William Burgess, commissioned by John Patrick Crichton-Stuart, the Third Marquess of Bute. Crichton-Stuart intended the building to be his little hideaway in the hills, but apparently, it failed to meet his expectations. The following owner of Castell Coch, a Lady Gwendolyn, was driven out of the building not long after it came into her possession. According to Gwendolyn, she frequently encountered the spirit of a woman dressed in white. Though the ghost did not appear to be malevolent or in any way interested in the business of the new owner, Gwendolyn, like most people, decided it was one haunting too many and went packing. The woman is not believed to have any connection to the castle, but rather to the centuries-old ground upon which it was built. Her time on earth was marred by the loss of her son, who disappeared when still a child. It was later discovered that the boy had fallen into a well and drowned, though the woman never learned of this. She still roams the area around Castell Coch, presumably searching for her son, unaware that he has moved on. I have never actually been inside the grounds of Castell Coch, but I have been around the area before as a few years ago when I was doing security I actually went there and had a walk around, I did not see nor feel any paranormal activities, but you know maybe one day when I do venture inside it, I will.
SAINT FAGAN'S, Cardiff
St. Fagans is a village on Cardiff's outskirts, known for St. Fagans Castle. This Elizabethan manor has extensive gardens, with fountains, the Italian Garden and a rosary. Also within its grounds, the open-air St. Fagans National Museum of History showcases historic buildings relocated from across Wales, including a farm, a tannery, mills and a chapel. The Museum stands in the grounds of St Fagans Castle and gardens, a late 16th century manor house donated to the people of Wales by the Earl of Plymouth in 1948. There are over 50 historic buildings from all over Wales have been re-built at the Museum including a Victorian school, a medieval church and a Workmen’s Institute. Visit Llys Llywelyn – a medieval prince’s hall, see the Victorian school or pick up some Welsh food from 1920s Gwalia Stores. Visit the animals on Llwyn-yr-eos Farm or call in to see our craftspeople at work in the smithy, the clogmaker’s workshop and the corn and woollen mills. St Fagans Museum is said to be the most haunted museum in the country. A vast history of buildings brought from all over Wales as a means to preserve the culture and reputation of Wales and the home to an Elizabethan Mansion built on the foundations of a castle dating back nearly 900 years. It is said that many of the ghosts at St Fagans came with the buildings, that they have a permanent attachment to them. Or are the spirits at St Fagans those who perished in the mighty civil war battle fought here in 1648? Or could it be that the spirits here are those of the various families who occupied the land over the years, and of those who may have worked and farmed this mystical land. I have only been to St. Fagan's once as a kid, and it was a part of a school trip to learn more about people in the 19th century and their lives and while walking through the shops and being in the classroom it felt to me like someone was watching. That's the only paranormal experience I remember having there which had me unsettled during the trip.
CARDIFF CASTLE, Cardiff
Cardiff Castle is a beautiful place situated in the centre of Cardiff and has an on-site museum and manor home. Only as recently as 1st September this year (2022) visited the insides of the castle grounds and museum and as of writing, I have not ventured in the illustrious manor house walls BUT you can tell this place is so special and although at first-hand experience with my walk through the castle and museum that I had nothing paranormal happen or felt anything ghosty that's not to say this place has no hauntings. Onto the history of this Castle now; The site on which Cardiff Castle is built has been one of the most important pieces of land in all of South Wales since the 1st Century. It was here that the Romans built one of their many defence structures during their time ruling over what would later become the United Kingdom. It is believed that the original Roman fort lasted for about thirty years, coming down just before 100 AD and a part of the original Roman wall's is still up inside the Museum in the Castle. After Roman rule came to an end, there wasn’t a lot of activity on the site until the Normans came gallanting along in the early 1000s. After being passed from owner to owner, Cardiff Castle fell into the Bute family’s hands, who held onto it until 1947, when the Fifth Marquess of Bute presented it to the county council. Obviously, there is a lot of history at Cardiff Castle. So it should come as no surprise that paranormal activity at the building is reported with a startling degree of frequency. Of the many haunted rooms in the castle, one of the most active is the stockroom, where items are moved around and rearranged almost every morning by an unknown force. The few who have been lucky (or unlucky) enough to be there when this was going on, report that the items are moved by a ghost garbed in a white skirt, resembling more a cloud of smoke than a human. The daily paranormal activity also occurs in the main dining room of the castle. It is here at a quarter past three every morning that the doors of the room open and shut by themselves, regardless of whether they have been locked. Frequently spotted at Cardiff Castle is the spirit of the Second Marquess of Bute, who oversaw restoration on the site but died before it was completed. He is seen to navigate the castle like the traditional ghost, walking through walls until he gets to his desired location. For the Second Marquess of Bute, that location is a room next to the chapel, where he passed away in 1848.
LLANCAIACH FAWR MANOR, Nelson
I have talked about this and my experiences a lot in the past as I have visited this place twice, once as a kid and the other time when I was a teenager. I felt like someone was watching me and I have seen a crib move, and also I felt like I was pushed in the armoury as I fell down and almost tumbled down the staircase. Furthermore, I'm all good and fine, but you know there's a weird prepense I felt there, and I do want to go back and visit again and see if I get any other feelings or weird goings-on. Nobody is quite sure just when Llancaiach Fawr Manor was built, but references to the building appear in John Leland’s Itinerary, released in 1537. The consensus is that the manor was built in or around 1530. It was constructed on the ruins of another building and was designed so that it would be handily defended should relations between Wales and Britain break down. Today, the Grade 1 building operates as a living-history museum, though visitors to Llancaich Fawr Manor experience a bit of undead history while they’re there. The manor’s ghosts are many in number and varied in their behaviour, with almost every room in the building having its own spirit assigned to it. Rather than simply materializing – which they do with some frequency – the manor’s spirits make themselves known through blasts of cold air, random scents, and disembodied sounds such as footsteps and voices. Many expectant mothers who have visited the castle have reported feeling uneasy and dizzy upon entering the building, with most having to sit down or leave before their condition worsens. This could be linked to the spirit of a young boy who is often seen and heard by the manor staff. It is believed that the boy met his end after falling from one of the manor’s upper rooms, which left him with fatal injuries. However, the injuries do not seem to plague the spirit in the afterlife, as he is quite active and has been reported to tug on the sleeves of guests and lead them by hand throughout the manor. One paranormal researcher who investigated Llancaich Fawr Manor even claimed to have summoned the boy using a simple ball in a cup toy. According to the investigator, she was aided by the child in landing the ball inside the wooden cup after multiple failed attempts to do it herself. Some people recall seeing maid's or a lady in the garden or staring out the window at the garden also. This has been featured on some paranormal investigations and tv shows such as Most Haunted. You can read my past blog on this lovely Manor here - https://1stmetalgodsblog.blogspot.com/2019/11/llancaiach-fawr-as-kid-ghost-story.html
Visit these places and let me know if you have had any spooky experiences and of course view more paranormal locations and luscious locations on the Visit Wales website.
Also check out the RCT website.
Thanks for visiting my blog and viewing this post! :)
Stay Spooky!
