MrCake wrote:I'm attending an event at St David's Hall in central Cardiff in April. Travelling by train with just one small travel bag. Can anyone recommend good accommodation walkable (say up to 1 mile) for Cardiff Central train station and St David's Hall? Any type of accommodation will do, and any budget, as long as it's clean and comfortable and not too noisy.
Also, any recommendations for what to see/do there as I will probably stay a couple of nights?
Diolch yn fawr.
Mr C
Cardiff is short of hotel rooms and bargains are hard to find. Our business visitors mainly stay in the Novotel, Radisson Blu or Marriott which are all in or near the centre. £80 - £100 a night plus.
The castle has a Norman keep, and an interesting military museum, but the highlight is the Victorian rooms (extra charge and guided tours only) which are from the time when the Bute family were among the richest in the world. Don't miss the animal wall just outside. The Cardiff Story museum is very interactive, does what it says (free, IIRC). The National Museum has a surprisingly good impressionist collection, amongst lots of other good stuff (free). The Victorian shopping arcades are nice just to walk through and have a selection of independent shops. The Millennium sorry Principality stadium does guided tours. Always good to do the hop-on-hop-off bus tour (stop outside the castle) if you have limited time in a strange city. All these are in the centre.
There are buses, trains or water taxi (On the river in the lovely big park next to the castle) down to the bay (journey is about a mile or so from the centre) where there is a walk around, water based activities, various marquee buildings (Millennium Centre, Pierhead, Norwegian Church, Senedd) a slightly odd memorial to a dead character from Torchwood, some statuary, and a variety of pubs and restaurants. The Dr Who exhibition is gone.
Slightly further afield in St Fagan's there is the Museum of Welsh History, an outdoor museum with various historic buildings re-erected there (free but pay for parking, no idea about public transport). Or even further in Blaenavon which is about 45 minutes by car, there is Big Pit, a former working deep mine which is now a mining museum.
There are plenty of other ideas at
www.visitcardiff.com, including a couple of suggested itineraries.
There is a rapidly expanding bike hire service
https://www.nextbike.co.uk/en/cardiff/DM