Llanfair Waterdine

Place name

Location

Amenities

• A village hall - the Everest Hall
• A 16th-century public house, which is now primarily a restaurant and hotel, the Waterdine. The pub was originally built on the nearby Drover's road to serve the drovers taking livestock to English markets.

  Walking

• The Jack Mytton Way
• Offa's Dyke Path
• Glyndŵr's Way

  Famous and former residents

• John Hunt, Baron Hunt of Llanvair Waterdine, KG, CBE, DSO, the leader of the first successful expedition to climb Mount Everest, moved to the area after World War II. The village hall in Llanfair Waterdine is dedicated to his achievement and is called the "Everest Hall".
• Hywel ap Syr Mathew, poet and historian, was a native of the village. He took part in the first Eisteddfod at Caerwys in 1523, and was said by Lewys Dwnn to have been a bardic teacher. He addressed eulogies and elegies in the traditional manner to some of the leading figures of his time, including William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, and Richard Davies, the Protestant bishop of St David's. An accomplished scribe, he made copies of The Book of Arms and was a herald bard. His chronicle of British history, written in the Welsh language, survives in two copies; it follows the style of contemporary historians in England, beginning with the sons of Noah and continuing down to 1556. In it Hywel states that he had been present at the siege of Boulogne in 1544 and some of his comments suggest that he was a devout Catholic. Both Lewys Dwnn and Dafydd Benwyn wrote elegies for him on his death.