New Quay

Bottlenose dolphins are seen off the harbour here through the summer, sometimes close enough to watch from the wall with an ice cream in your hand. New Quay, Cei Newydd, is a village of terraces stacked above three beaches on Cardigan Bay, home to Britain's largest resident population of the animals and the best place in Wales to meet them.

Harbour Beach sits under the village, sheltered by the harbour wall, with fine sand, a designated swimming area and lifeguards in the summer season; Dolau lies beyond the wall, and Traeth Gwyn runs almost a mile towards Llanina Point, wilder and cut off at high water. The dolphins are the summer draw, and the boat trips are run by skippers accredited under the WISe code, feeding sightings to the Sea Watch Foundation, one of them with a hydrophone that lets you hear the animals below. The Cardigan Bay Marine Wildlife Centre, in a heritage building over the beach since 1996, is staffed by volunteers and explains the bay's big three, dolphin, porpoise and grey seal, along with the sunfish, basking sharks and occasional whales that turn up. Dylan Thomas lived at Majoda above Traeth Gwyn through the winter of 1944 to 1945, escaping his household to the pubs, and the town is thought by many to be one of the originals for Llareggub. A regatta fills the harbour each August and a race into the sea greets New Year's Day; Aberaeron, seven miles on, has honey ice cream and a painted harbour for the second afternoon.