Think – a week with the extended family in a cottage in the cold, wild, wind swept hills of Snowdonia. The “Boat House” at Tan Y Bwlch in Snowdonia is a something of a Tardis. From the outside appearing to be small, cold, dark and Spartan, but from the inside, white walls, soaring ceilings, in floor heating, designer kitchen, comfy furniture and abundant bathrooms

We imagine that the owners adopted the shell of an abandoned stone cottage as a project. The previous occupiers of the cottage had been a colony of bats, consequently the development includes a handsome bat refuge so as to be environmentally sensitive.

Tan Y Bwlch is midway between Portmadog on the coast and Blaenau FFestiniog in the slate encrusted hills an hour away by the famous Ffestiniog narrow gauge railway. The railway was built in 1836 to shift slate from Ffestiniog down to the coast. The slate trolleys rolled down the flimsy iron rails by gravity and were hauled back empty by horses. Proper rails, steam trains and the passenger service came later.

In case you are interested, Tan Y Bwlch is pronounced Tan ee boolk and means under the pass or gap. In common with some other British railways, the Ffestiniog train only has one first class and many third class carriages. No second class. Firmly separating the haves from the have nots. We have nots could only press our noses against the windows of the first class carriage and hungrily watch as the privileged people wallowed in luxury.

Caught the train up to Ffestiniog and gave ourselves a couple of hours to check out the shops and sights of the slate town, have a coffee and catch the next train down. Stumbled on a lovely folksy coffee shop that had books, mags and games for the use of customers. Included a game called Carcassonne. In contrast to the world domination game of Risk, the aim of Carcassonne is simply to build a medieval country with farms, farmers, monasteries, city walls, robbers and knights and so on. The guys all got so engrossed in the game that we didn’t see anything of the town, missed the train and nearly missed the one after that.

Lovely day for boating on the Dwyryd estuary. Six of us in kayaks and canoes with Grandma on camera duty on the bank. Paddling uphill for an hour or so then cruising back. Blissful, uneventful communion with nature. Entertainment was the owner’s Labrador who divided his time between being a passenger, swimming alongside and sauntering along the bank. Afternoon tea at the posh Plas Tan Y Bwlch, the local 4 storey manor house. Now a national trust treasure, the house and gardens were commenced in the seventeenth century and by the late eighteenth cent. were the domain of one of the local slate barons.

The grandsons have grown somewhat since last time. The elder two now, from a base of very large feet, being able to converse face to face with me when standing. As expected they are quite loud and physical with a lot of wrestling and whistling. In one of the rare quiet times they introduced me to their version of the card game “Cheat” and I showed them how to play Rickety Kate and Cribbage with an improvised cardboard and match stick score board. At intervals, all of the men indulge with multiple devices in the world domination computer game Risk. The boys insist on introducing optional hazards like Zombies. Fair enough, in this world of Trump and Brexit. Results of 4 days of Rickety Kate show me at the bottom of the list. After more than fifty years of playing the game, I expected to do better than this. Dammit! These children are so alarmingly clever, having already mastered the essential duplicity and treachery of the game.