Template:FP-Menai Strait

The Menai Strait from the Anglesey shore

Menai Strait The Menai Strait is a narrow stretch of shallow by strongly tidal water about fifteen miles long, which separates the island county of Anglesey from Caernarfonshire on the mainland of Great Britain. The strait varies in width from 440 yards from Fort Belan to Abermenai Point to 1,200 yards from Traeth Gwyllt to Caernarfon Castle. It then narrows to about 550 yards in the middle reaches (Port Dinorwic and Menai Bridge) and then it broadens again. At its eastern mouth, between Puffin Island and Penmaenmawr, it is just under five miles across. This is a notoriously hazardous water: differential tides at the ends of the strait cause very strong currents in opposing directions, seen in the Swellies in the midst of the strait where rocks near the surface cause over-falls and local whirlpools which drive small boats onto the rocks and which sank HMS Conway as recently as 1953. Thankfully for the traveller the water is crossed by two bridges, for road and rail. (Read more)