I'll let you in on a secret I discovered this weekend. Want to know a foolproof way to feel as if your job is a million miles away? Ride a horse through the sea. Try it, and then come back and tell me you were still thinking about that conference call you have to make on Monday.
Yes, yes, you'll say, assuming I was off on a swanky hack's jaunt to Tristan da Cunha or some other such place where horse-riding in the sea is a feasible activity in February. Well, I wasn't. I was in Wales.
It may not be the first place you'd think of for a weekend break in winter, but St David's peninsula in Pembrokeshire has a great deal going for it. The coastline is exposed, rugged and dramatically beautiful, although the gnarled rocks, twisted by wind and waves into fantastic sculptures, bear witness to the notoriously inclement weather. You certainly don't go to Wales for the sun in the winter - hell, you don't go to Wales for the sun in the summer if you're playing the odds - so I was anticipating a couple of days of windswept clifftop walks and cosy pints in firelit pubs. And sure enough, on the second day, the area lived up to my expectations: rolling grey skies and grass laid flat by wind cold enough to make your teeth ache. But on our first day we woke up to the sort of unqualified, wall-to-wall sunshine you don't expect to see outside of Bermuda.
We were staying at Crug-Glas Country House, about a 10-minute drive outside of St Davids. Originally a farmhouse, and still attached to a working farm, the place is impressive from the outside and breathtaking within. The six bedrooms have been sensitively restored with original features and fittings wherever possible, and are luxurious without being flashy. Ours was cream, with splashes of deep red and old gold, and views across the farmyard at the back and open countryside to the front. Our arrival coincided, fortuitously, with Valentine's Day, and the surroundings were certainly designed to promote serious, 19th-century-novel-style romance. Our room was furnished with, among other things, a high, four-poster bed big enough to throw a party on, a bath built for two, a vase of fresh yellow tea roses on the table by the window and a complementary foot-long chocolate Welsh love spoon (based on the wooden spoons Welsh men used to carve into fabulous shapes for their sweethearts), which my boyfriend later polished off in one sitting.
After an excellent meal and the couple of bottles of wine which such splendid surroundings seemed to demand, we woke up feeling groggy, but the sunlight streaming through the windows didn't give my hangover a chance. Orange juice, coffee, toast and homemade croissants - plus a full cooked breakfast if you wanted one - saw us on our way.
First stop was Whitesands Bay - a tourist honeypot during the summer months, but practically deserted off-season: we counted just four other people and two dogs. By this point I had come to the conclusion that everyone who had ever lived in or been to Wales was involved in some vast, selfish conspiracy to discourage the rest of us from going there. This was not the bleak, sheep-and-glottal-stop filled land of legend, this was the Seychelles with a fresh February snap in the air. The sky was unbroken blue from horizon to horizon, the sea was green and white where it swirled up the beach and the sand itself was flat and shiny and stretched for miles with barely a footprint to interrupt it (except for the spot - it was Saturday February 15 - where we wrote 'No To War' in foot-high letters). Idyllic doesn't touch it.
Inland, the towns and villages carry on the seaside theme: the houses are low and square and painted in sugar-almond pinks and yellows; the shops sell fishing nets, sweets in jars and, frequently, cheese. Visitors to St Davids - our nearest port of call - receive an extra fillip from the knowledge that they are standing in the UK's smallest city. Granted city status by Queen Elizabeth II in 1995 on account of the glorious 12th-century cathedral which dominates it from a hollow by the river, St Davids is in reality no more than a village with pretensions - its other claim to fame is that it is the only city in Britain to have just one pub. Fortunately the Farmer's Arms is as snug a hostelry as you could wish for, serving tasty pub grub and a good selection of beers. Top tip: go for the booze but stay for the yummy rice pudding.
But it was the ride that sealed the deal. Childhood reminiscences inspired by the bucket-and-spade feel of the place led to an idle conversation about riding, and suddenly it seemed that the ideal way to see the area would be from the back of a horse. My boyfriend and I were just this side of rank amateurs - both of us were prepubescent the last time we'd gone near a horse - but we didn't let that stop us, oh no. A quick phone call to the East Nolton Riding Stables established that there would be a ride going out that afternoon, and before we knew it we were being fitted out with helmets and hoisted onto the backs of a couple of sturdy beasts by the names of Monty and Megan. Less Zorro and Tornado than Farmer Giles and his nag, we nevertheless felt like cowboys as soon as we were comfortable enough in the saddle not to worry constantly about sliding off. We were led a merry route in the sunshine, with the odd canter thrown in just to guarantee that our buttocks would be entirely black and blue by the time we stumbled off. But the high point came at the end of the ride when we trotted down to the beach.
The sun was setting across the water, the waves splashed down onto the beach and we waded out on horseback into the foam - sounds like a badly written scene from a Mills and Boon novel, doesn't it? But it really was like that, honest: some kind of crazy Caribbean-slash-Cymru fantasy, with a dollop of Jilly Cooper thrown in for good measure.
The weather the next day was, alas, much more along the lines of what I'd been expecting: wildly windy and bitterly cold. But there was plenty to do even without the sunshine. Solva, a town a couple of miles outside of St Davids, has lots of nice boutique-y shops and pubs. Or if you are after something to take home with you, you can buy local Llangoffan Farmhouse cheese from the shop on the farm where it's made (turn up early enough and you can watch the cheesemaking process before you buy). We opted for a trip to the tiny fishing village of Porthgain and a teeth-chatteringly cold walk along the cliffs, followed by some of the best mackerel pate I've ever tasted. Wales: everything I hoped it would be, plus sunshine. You can't say fairer than that.
Ways to go
Sarah Crown stayed in Pembrokeshire courtesy of Crug-Glas Country House Hotel, Abereiddy. Prices for a double room with breakfast start from £30pp per night, based on two sharing, and dinner is £18 for four courses and coffee. Telephone 01348 831302 or visit the website at www.crug-glas.co.uk for details.
She travelled to Pembrokeshire with First Great Western. Fares from London Paddington to Swansea start from £26. For more information, visit www.firstgreatwestern.co.uk, or to make a booking call 08457 000 125.
For more information on Pembrokeshire, call 08705 103 103 or visit www.visitpembrokeshire.co.uk to obtain a free copy of the Pembrokeshire Guide. Details of leisure activities and attractions can also be found on www.activitypembrokeshire.co.uk.
