Criccieth Castle
Photo via Wikimedia Commons — licence & author.
Welsh-built castle between two beaches
This is a quick reference, not a full walked guide. The facts below — location, parking, grid reference and access — are maintained from our dataset, but we haven't published our own first-hand write-up of Criccieth Castle yet. Know it well? Help us get it right.
A castle with two histories: first raised by the Welsh princes, then captured and remodelled by Edward I, its twin-towered gatehouse standing on a green headland that splits two beaches. The views run across Cardigan Bay to Harlech. It makes a perfect picnic-and-paddle-plus-castle stop on any Llŷn road trip — and a Cadwalader's ice cream in the little seaside town below is practically compulsory. Cadw charges admission.
Getting there
Criccieth Castle is in Criccieth, Llŷn, Llŷn Peninsula. It's roughly 4 min (0.2 miles) from Criccieth , and within reach of Harlech (21 min) and Pwllheli (25 min).
The nearest parking: On-street/seafront parking below the castle. Grid reference SH 499 377 — works on any OS map and doesn't need a phone signal.
Good to know
Fine picnic-on-the-beach-plus-castle stop on any Llŷn road trip.
On the map
View Criccieth Castle on OpenStreetMap ↗, or open it in the Explore Wales trip planner to add it to a day out with drive times and offline maps.
Staying over?
Criccieth makes a relaxed base for exploring the area — worth staying over to catch an early start or a golden-hour finish.
Browse places to stay near Criccieth ↗ opens Booking.com — needs signalNearby places
Make Criccieth Castle part of a day out
Add it to a trip in the free Explore Wales planner — chained drive times, weather, campsite suggestions, and offline maps for when the signal drops.