Red Wharf Bay facts for kids

Traeth Coch (Welsh for "red beach") is a wide sandy bay and an area of outstanding natural beauty on the east coast of the island of Anglesey in Wales. The bay is also known in English as Red Wharf Bay and lies between the villages of Pentraeth and Benllech. It is also close to Castell Mawr Rock, thought to be the site of an Iron Age fort.

Red Wharf Bay beach itself has a large expanse of sand at low tide.

Village

The village of Red Wharf Bay is on the western shore of the bay. The village is linked to Benllech and Pentraeth via the Anglesey Coastal Path. Red Wharf Bay has three restaurants—The Tavern on the Bay, The Ship Inn, and The Boathouse—all with views of the bay.

Wildlife

The bay attracts an abundance or wildlife, including a large number of waterfowl and wading birds, such as oystercatchers, shelduck, purple sandpipers, curlew and dunlin. The bay is bordered by salt marshes and sand dunes. Some of these dunes are rich in shell fragments that support the flora common to lime-rich areas, including the pyramidal orchid.

Events

Each year the Red Wharf Bay Sailing Club Anglesey Offshore Dinghy Race takes place from Beaumaris to Traeth Bychan. The 14-mile (23 km) race runs up the Menai Strait and down the Anglesey coast.

History

There was once a railway line which terminated at the bay, the Red Wharf Bay branch line, which left the Anglesey Central Railway at Pentre Berw. Stone for the Admiralty Arch, Holyhead was quarried near the bay.