WHY?
Because this isn’t just Pembrokeshire’s but Britain’s most picturesque harbour, with not one, not two, but four town beaches to choose between. The Georgians and Victorians visited it as a health resort. You’ll certainly come away feeling as though you’ve completed a course of something stronger than you can get over the counter.
WHAT TO DO
The beaches, obviously. North Beach, with hulking Goscar Rock in the middle, as if it’s just crash-landed from space, has views back to the harbour’s multi-hued cottages. Harbour Beach, which you can walk straight to at low tide, has bobbing boats and a hut that sells buckets for crabbing, and tea in proper mugs for £1. Castle Beach has caves to play Famous Five in. Then promenade with your parasol to the wild, dune-backed, 1½-mile-long South Beach.
Seal-spotting trips leave from the harbour (£20, kids £12; tenbyboattrips.co.uk), as do boat rides to visit the Cistercian monks on Caldey Island (£12/£6; caldey-island.co.uk) — both weather permitting.
Immune to the elements is a rainy-day tour of the retro sweet shops of St George’s Street, pocket-money sinkholes selling floral gums and Vimto cubes by the 100g. Staffed by eager volunteers, the Tudor Merchant’s House has toys to fiddle with and costumes to dress up in, and reveals a 15th-century storage solution for infants: in a bag hung from a peg by the fireplace. It kept them out of the rats’ way, apparently (£5.25/£2.60; nationaltrust.org.uk). The idiosyncratic Tenby Museum & Art Gallery displays everything from fossils to works by the Tenby-born Augustus John and his (more talented) sister, Gwen (£4.95/free; tenbymuseum.org.uk).
If the weather is set fair, Saundersfoot is a 10-minute drive north, a sensational expanse of sand that made Travel’s top 50 British beaches in June. Go at low tide for optimal rock-pool poking. The amusement arcade is unvarnished, unironic fun.
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WHERE TO EAT
The only downside to the Salt Cellar, on the Esplanade, is its basement location (mains from £16; thesaltcellartenby.co.uk). At Coast, at the far end of Saundersfoot’s beach, the TV chef Will Holland does artful things with fish and lamb in a light-filled wooden hut (mains from £18; coastsaundersfoot.co.uk). For lunch, it’s crab sandwiches (£5.95) with the locals at the Hope & Anchor, on St Julian Street, which serves beers made 243ft away by the fledgling Harbwr Brewery. Your favourite meal of the holiday, though, will be cod and chips from D Fecci & Sons, on Lower Frog Street (from £5.95). To be eaten on the wall at Harbour Beach.
WHERE TO STAY
For plush Pembrokeshire, Tenby is shy on sophisticated accommodation. The Broadmead Boutique B&B, up the hill, is doing much to redress this, and serves buck’s fizz at breakfast (doubles from £95, B&B; broadmeadtenby.wales). St Brides Spa Hotel has sea-view rooms, a sea-view restaurant and an ace sea-view hot tub above Saundersfoot’s beach (doubles from £170, B&B; stbridesspahotel.com).
The most romantic hotel in Wales is 20 minutes’ drive away: the Grove, outside Narberth, is a restored country house filled with the comforting smell of wood smoke — now with sexy new cottages (doubles from £155, B&B; thegrove-narberth.co.uk).
Martin Hemming was a guest of Visit Pembrokeshire (visitpembrokeshire.com) and Europcar, which has rentals from £12 a day (europcar.co.uk)
