Distance: 9.7 miles

Difficulty of the terrain: hard

Get the route: via Ordnance Survey Maps or download the GPX. file from Dropbox

Walk from Gobowen Railway Station to Llangollen on the River Dee. The walking route crosses the Welsh border, passes Chirk Castle and descends the foothills of the Clwydian Range.

The Story

Route Notes

Getting Back

Oh I do like to be beside the Dee’s side

Situated right at the bottom of Denbighshire, the little town of Llangollen has a solid claim to be amongst the most southerly places in northern Wales.

Llangollen’s history is dated back to the 7th Century when Saint Collen, who lends his name to the town, is thought to have founded a church there. A church in the early medieval tradition where, unlike in modern recent times, religious establishments were often set-up quite some way from centres of population in a fashion more akin to the later monastic tradition. 

Over the centuries this religious establishment drew people to Llangollen. The town is also handily situated at a good crossing place across the River Dee. A location right at the place where the wide River Dee Valley which runs towards the edge of the plain that marks the boundary with the English counties of Shropshire and Cheshire, narrows into the highlands of the Clwydian Range of hills. 

An Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, and more recently a National Landscape, having been designated for protection in 1985. In the 2020s the area is subject to a contested attempt to make it Wales’ fourth national park after Eryri, Bannau Brycheiniog, and the Pembrokeshire Coast.

Having long been a market town and staging post for people looking to traverse the Clwydian Hills heading further west into Wales towards the Irish Sea, Llangollen has been firmly on the tourist trail since the 19th Century. 

With its river side location, ice cream parlours, bakeries and numerous other eating locations, Llangollen is further grist to the mill of proof, if was needed, that Midlanders and other daytrippers far from the sea will flock to anywhere with a little bit of water that resembles the seaside.

Indeed, the majority of jobs in the little town of around 3,600 people are in the tourism industry. This includes the small paid staff of the largely volunteer run Llangollen Railway. This was created in the mid-1970s, celebrating its 50th anniversary in 2025, and utilises 10 miles of the former Ruabon to Barmouth Railway Line which once ran through the hilly terrain of North Wales, closing in stages during the 1960s. This route if it has survived would doubtless be popular today with tourists flocking, as so many especially from West Midlands county do, to Barmouth and the coast as well as stopping off at Llangollen.

Not that the Ruabon to Barmouth railway line constructed by the Great Western Railway company during the 1860s was the first attempt to bring a high volume, reliable, transport system to Llangollen. The town is also remarkable for being an unusual westerly spur on the UK’s canal network. The Llangollen Canal running across the famously stunning Pontcysyllte Aqueduct connects this very Welsh town with the Shropshire Union Canal that runs towards the Mersey estuary through the heart of the northern English Midlands.

The Walk

Get the route: via Ordnance Survey Maps or download the GPX. file from Dropbox

I create the Walk Midlands routes via Ordnance Survey Maps Explorer enabling me to take them on my phone. Subscribe yourself via the banner above.

This walk from Gobowen to Llangollen on the River Dee in the foothills of the Clwydian Range, goes via the National Trust’s Chirk Castle, and begins from Gobowen Railway Station.

Upon alighting the train at Gobowen’s quaint railway station – the signalling system that manages the trains is still entirely manual – turn right and cross the tracks heading into the centre of the village.

From here a backstreets route bringings you to a tall narrow footbridge, enabling you to cross back over the railway line and down into a field.

Cross the field, to reach the side of the busy A5, the major route from this part of the Midlands to North Wales, and taking care, cross.

On the far side a footgate hidden behind some trees screening the A5 from the countryside beyond takes you across a field and onto a lane beside a scattering of houses.

From here a network of very quiet country lanes takes you across the pastoral north Shropshire landscape heading for the ridge whose summit predictably marks the boundary between England and Wales.

Approaching the village of Weston Rhyn only a mile or so south of the boundary between the two nation’s you can skip the asphalt by picking up a footpath that cuts the corner to arrive on the edge of the village.

Walk through the centre of the village, past a stone church and the pub, to pick up a road running north through its suburban hinterland, houses of various edges lining the road. Along the way you pass an unusual turreted terracotta redbrick building which might once have been a church or a community hall, but now looks disused. To the right, on the northernmost edge of Weston Rhyn lies the village’s non-conformist graveyard, still seemingly in use, where non-Anglican members of the community were historically buried.

North of Weston Rhyn now entering hillier country and the Welsh border you walk along a somewhat busier road. Take care as some of the bends are tight and motorists travel fast.

Descending into the valley of the River Ceiriog you approach a cluster of houses called Pont – Faen after the bridge across the river at this point. This section of the river marks the boundary between England and Wales.

Beside the river turn left and follow a narrow lane further into Pont – Faen. Before reaching the terrace that lies at the heart of the hamlet, clamber over a stile and follow a well worn footpath across pasture beside the Ceiriog. This runs through a limestone dale type valley beside the river.

Presently the dale narrows and the pasture ends. Then climb another stile and head uphill along a well worn path to the left.

At the top you come out onto a road, which due to significant subsidence had been closed by Shropshire Council to all but walkers and cyclists, when I walked the route in early April 2025. 

Turning right on this road follow it along the brow of the hill winding past a series of houses, with commanding views across the River Ceiriog’s Valley over the Wales and the top of the National Trust’s Chirk Castle poking up above the trees on the far side.

Head down a steep lane to a bridge across the River Ceiriog, and into Wales. A plaque on the northern bank marks a battle understood to have taken place nearby in the 1160s where a Welsh army beat off the conquering English who were trying to capture North Wales.

Beyond the bridge cross over a main road and head to the right up a path running uphill through woodland across the Chirk Castle estate.

Follow the path across a hillside pasture, with impressive views back towards Shropshire, then along a woodland track.

This track soon brings you out by the car park and other facilities for the National Trust owned and managed Chirk Castle. Here follow a road which runs around the base of the mound that the castle sits upon.

On reaching the car park turn left following the edge of the car park to a gateway, which leads you along a parkland track, and then uphill away from the castle site.

Partway uphill near woodland next to two former estate cottages you pick up a quiet lane which leads you up into the trees.

Continue following the lane uphill through the woodland. It was fairly quiet when I walked the route but take care.

Presently it levels out and you walk along between two sheep pastures. After a little way views open up to the right and straight ahead out across the Cheshire and north Shropshire Plains and across to the Clwydian Hills.

Soon you reach a gateway which leads onto a well worn track which runs across the hillside almost all the way to Llangollen.

As you walk along the track there are spectacular views across the Clwydian Hills. If you look back along one wooded section, towards the plain and England, the Llangollen Canal’s rightly famed Pontcysyllte Aqueduct can be clearly glimpsed.

Presently the track begins to descend down the steep bowl of a valley which runs to the west into the heart of the hills.

At the bottom of the track you head to the right following a quiet road towards the edge of Llangollen.

As you walk you enter woodland. Look out on your left for a path running off the road into the trees.

Having turned onto this path you follow it uphill through the woodland.

Soon you come out onto an edge where Llangollen framed by the Clwydian Hills lies beneath you.

Follow a path down from the edge into the houses on the edge of the town, and then follow a quiet road which runs down to the busy A5 where it runs through the centre of the town.

Turn left and follow the A5 into the heart of Llangollen.

Soon you reach signs for the town centre and turn right down a shop and cafe lined road running towards the bridge across the River Dee. The heritage railway and the Llangollen Canal lie on the far side of the Dee.

This is where the walk ends.

Getting Back

Llangollen has lacked a national railway connection since the 1960s. It does, however, have a good bus service throughout the day to Ruabon and onto Wrexham which do have stations. At the time of writing in April 2025 the Number 5 bus service was half hourly for much of the day on weekdays and Saturdays (less frequent on Sundays) to Ruabon and Wrexham from Llangollen. Both Wrexham and Ruabon have trains running north towards Chester and Holyhead, as well as south to the West Midlands conurbation via Shrewsbury. Buses also depart from Llangollen throughout the day towards Chirk (which is also on the line between Wrexham and Shrewsbury, then onto Birmingham), as well as west across the Clwydian Hills via Lake Bala to Barmouth on the Welsh Coast, following the route of Llangollen’s long lost railway mainline.