The Heart of North Wales

Denbigh is a place of wide horizons and open spaces where you can be as active as you like, or to do next to nothing in a beautiful setting.

There are plenty of interesting walks in and around the town, or you could stroll a few minutes outside town to the wild moors, hills, forests and lakes.

It’s the perfect base for visitors who want to experience the richness and variety that North Wales has to offer – take a short drive to the North Wales coast or the outstandingly beautiful Clwydian Range, one of only four Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) in Wales – or drive west across the mysterious wilderness of Mynydd Hiraethog into the rugged mountains of Snowdonia.

Hike, climb, ride, fish, trek. Whatever takes your fancy, you’ll find it near Denbigh.

Villages nearby

Whitchurch – (known locally as Llandyrnog) so called because of its grand whitewashed church – lies a mile outside the town but St Marcella’s is the parish church of Denbigh. It houses many fine monuments from Denbigh’s Elizabethan golden age.

Henllan is well known for its distinctive parish church with the fortress-like tower detached from the main building. It is thought that it was built this way to increase the area in which the bells could be heard.

The Llindir Inn is believed to be one of the oldest pubs in Wales, and is well known for its ghost, ‘an attractive woman in white’.

Llannefydd, less than six miles north west of Denbigh, is home to Saint Nefydd and Saint Mary’s church dating back to the fifth century. In a nearby cave in the 1970s, archaeologists unearthed the teeth and jawbone of an 11 year old Neanderthal boy dating from 230,000 years ago – the oldest human remains discovered in Wales.

Thomas Edwards, better known as the Welsh language dramatist and poet Twm o’r Nant, was born in Llannefydd in 1738. The theatre in Denbigh is named after him.

Nantglyn is know for the “pulpit in a tree” built into an ancient yew in the churchyard. Tradition has it that Methodist minister John Wesley to used to preach from there during the 18th century

St Asaph is believed to have developed around a sixth-century Celtic monastery founded by Saint Kentigern, and is home to the small fourteenth century St Asaph Cathedral. The original Welsh Bible, translated into Welsh in 1588 by William Morgan is kept on public display in the cathedral.

Ruthin is situated eight miles from Denbigh and it is well worth visiting for its Victorian jailhouse and state-of-the-art Craft Centre.