Mysterious Britain & Ireland

Specific Location: Cardigan Bay

Legends

Sarn-y-Bwlch

Sarn-y-Bwlch (Causeway of the Pass) is the middle of the three Cardigan Bay sarnau. It is the smallest of the three sarns, and it extends for about 6 kilometres offshore out from Pen Bwlch point at Tywyn, in a south westerly direction. Its charted depth is as shallow as 0.3 metres (Admiralty chart 1972).

Legends

Sarn Gynfelyn

Sarn Cynfelin (Saint Cynfelyn’s Causeway) is the southern most of the three Cardigan Bay sarnau, and begins just below the farmhouse at Wallog, situated on the cliffs between Borth and Clarach, and it extends for fourteen kilometres offshore into Cardigan Bay. Approximately half way along its length, it is bisected by a channel which is about five metres deep.

Legends

Sarn Badrig

Sarn Badrig, also known as St. Patrick’s Causeway, starts from Mochras point on Shell Island (or Mochras) and extends out in to Cardigan Bay for about twenty-four kilometres (fourteen miles, some nine of which are exposed at neap tides). It is one of three such ridges of rock and shingle that can be found on this west Welsh coast.

Legends

Aberdyfi and Cardigan Bay

The area around Cardigan Bay has a number of ‘lost land’ legends pertaining to it. These legends have changed over the centuries.

The most recent story concerns ‘The Lost Lowland Hundred’; lands now drowned which were ruled by a King called Gwyddno Garantir. The area was protected from the sea by a system of sluices, dams and waterways.

Folklore / Folktales / Welsh Folktales

The Lost Land of Wales

This tale is one of two stories of a similar theme attached to Cardigan Bay in Gwynedd. This story is the later one of the two and explains how a realm was lost to the sea through debauchery and drunkenness. There are traces of walls and roadways under the sea at Cardigan Bay, they can be seen at low tide and may have given rise to the legend of the ‘Lost Lowland Hundred’.