Episode 3 A Summer in Wales

-Summer in Wales is a time of celebration...

-ALL: Cheese!

..holidays...

I want to see a castle, pubs...

Keep rowing!

..and the great outdoors...

-Whoo!

-..a time when many businesses must turn a profit...

We have put everything we've got into this.

..or face a struggle to survive the rest of the year...

Got to keep your head above water.

..a time when good weather can make all things possible...

and bad can leave dreams in tatters.

The weather could be nicer, but that's nobody's fault.

This summer was truly extraordinary.

Was that the cleverest idea, to try and take it down?

It saw laughter...

..heartache...

This can be a cruel game.

..triumph...

I came second.

..and despair.

-The weather's beaten us once again.

-These are our stories...

Nice bit of pavement pizza in this corner here...

..filmed in every corner of the nation across the summer of 2012.

You can't beat it, can you?

This a story of A Summer In Wales.

Let's get the show on the road!

No-one comes to Wales looking for a tan,

and this summer certainly didn't disappoint.

But despite the grey skies, black clouds and heavy rain,

our overseas visitors kept on coming.

The American cruise liner Caribbean Princess, the largest ship

ever to visit our shores, came steaming into Holyhead harbour...

..on board 3,500 passengers planning to "do" North Wales in a day.

A long time ago, I knew someone from Wales,

and she said it was beautiful, that I had to see it.

So I'm here!

I want to see a castle, some pubs...

This is a once-in-a-lifetime deal.

My mother was an Owen.

Wasn't Tom Jones from Wales?

Yeah, we were Tom Jones fans a long time ago.

On the dockside, 45 coaches stand ready to whisk the passengers

to tourist locations all over north Wales.

And back again.

In the space of just 12 hours.

One of the top attractions on the list is Caernarfon Castle.

A tour of Welsh castles is the must-do activity

of your average overseas holidaymaker's trip to the UK,

ahead of Buckingham Palace, Harrods shopping,

a Premier League football match or a whisky tour.

The weather could be nicer, but that's nobody's fault,

so...I won't hold that against you! HE LAUGHS

In America, we do not have anything like this,

so to us it is amazing.

My wife was expecting more grand rooms,

like she's seen in the movies, but so far we haven't found those.

Unless you happen to know where they are...!

The castle seems to hold up better under the weather

than modern dwellings do.

I'd like to know where they got all the rock.

My name is Tyrone Powers, and I came all the way from Texas

just to see the beautiful castles in Wales.

This is a nice one. A very nice castle.

I came to Wales 15 years ago,

thought it was one of the most beautiful places in England.

What we love is the friendliness of the people.

We appreciate that very much.

We'll see what we can see and meet who we can meet

and enjoy every minute of it.

Just 30 miles along the coast from Caernarfon

is a much-loved destination for many British tourists,

Llandudno.

Wales's largest seaside resort has been offering holidaymakers

an old-fashioned beach experience

for over a century and a quarter.

Hello, everybody!

Here you can still find the delights of Punch and Judy and donkey rides.

In fact, of the eight donkey operators

that still survive in Wales, two can be found right here.

-Come on, girls.

-John Jones is a third-generation donkey man.

Donkeys are in his blood.

You fall in love with them. Each one's got little quirks

to them, and mannerisms.

They're great!

That one, she's actually a Romanian donkey.

She's very good, but there's something about her,

she's not like a British donkey.

And there IS a British donkey, no doubt about it. There is, definitely.

It's the summer half-term holidays,

the beginning of donkey season.

For the first time this year,

John is leading his animals down to the town's North Shore,

where his grandfather started the business.

We've worked this same section for at least the last 65 years.

It's what we call the Jettyside. It's got more sound on this one.

John only operates his donkeys in the summer months,

when there's a demand for rides,

but the rest of the year,

he relies on his plumbing and heating business to make a living.

Come on, girl. Hup, hup!

It's a glorious day, and the beach is busy.

The tide is on its way out,

and John should have plenty of sand on which to work.

But he's faced with a problem.

Had an awful lot of...

sea-defence work done,

and in the storms in winter it's brought stones down,

and we're losing our beach.

And I was hoping it would have been cleared, but, oh, look at it.

There's hardly anywhere to work now. Hardly anywhere at all.

We'll have to wait now at least another hour

before we can work down on the bottom end of the slipway.

It's not a good start to the season.

So we're here, but at the moment I just can't trade.

It's terrible.

Summer is festival season in Wales, with hundreds of events,

from local to international, taking place across the country.

For Wales's event caterers, it's their busiest season.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

OK, that one's ready.

Jonathan Williams is the founder and owner of Cafe Mor...

Crab sandwich.

..a mobile catering business specialising in fresh Welsh seafood.

The company is only a year old, but this summer,

Jonathan plans to launch himself into festival season in a big way...

-How's it all going?

-Getting there.

..with the help of his supportive mum, Tina.

I retired last year, y'know!

-Done more work in the last year than in the last 20, I think!

-Excuse me!

Next week's the first big one. That's Hay-on-Wye book festival.

250,000 people go to Hay. Obviously, it's international these days.

Y'know, you're keen to get everything spot-on and right.

And the next big one after that, then, we're doing Wakestock

up in north Wales, and it's definitely a younger market there.

-And then after that we've got the Eisteddfod.

-Yeah.

No, you grease the...

-I know what I'm doing!

-You grease the greaseproof paper.

-I know!

-Then what are you doing that for? I never do it like that!

Yeah, cos the greaseproof.. Just shush!

Last year, Cafe Mor was judged overall winner

of the British Street Food Festival.

Mix these brownies in there.

Jonathan's prize - a pitch in the athletes' village

of the London 2012 Olympics,

smack bang in the middle of Welsh festival season.

We're getting these beach shacks ready. It's going to be really busy.

I don't think about it all. I wouldn't be able to cope.

So I just think about the next week, really.

And if that weren't pressure enough,

Jonathan and his partner Hannah

are just weeks away from the birth of their first child.

If it comes on the 13th, 14th June, that'd be ideal. THEY LAUGH

There's no way I'm missing the birth of a child.

It could potentially come at any time,

but when it does, that's it, he's coming back to be with me.

There's no question about that. I don't care what he's doing!

Yeah, definitely, it's going to be a manic, manic summer.

Jonathan's first event of the season

is the ten-day Hay international book festival,

which this year is celebrating its 25th birthday.

Right, can I help anyone?

Big crowds are expected, and Jonathan's hoping to do well.

Are you taking the names on everyone's orders?

-They're all standing in front of us.

-Are they? Oh, hi.

Won't be long. Five minutes.

It's like a wave! Everyone's starving.

Cafe Mor catered the festival last year,

and Jonathan has a good grasp of what his well-read customers expect.

We don't have fresh crab in Oklahoma. That's a landlocked state.

She's my number one customer in Hay!

Business is good, but it's still early days.

With festival pitches costing thousands,

Jonathan needs to do well at each and every event this summer.

It's a great way to start the season,

and see how it goes

in the next couple of events, really.

It looks great, don't you think?

I think it's the best one here!

Summer is a busy time for many of Wales's private country houses.

Some 60 miles to the north of Hay stands Bryngwyn Hall,

ancestral seat of the Sandbach family

and home of Auriol, Marchioness of Linlithgow.

'I've known this house

'since I was five, and I completely fell in love with it.'

That's my grandfather.

He was Curzon's military secretary when Curzon was Viceroy of India.

And everything in here he brought back, which is extraordinary.

This is Gary,

an Indian gharial, which is an Indian alligator,

which was shot in Jogiwala

- wonderful name, Jogiwala, isn't it? -

in 1907.

And then we have Monty Python up there,

who was shot in Bhutan.

He might need a bit of restoration one day, but he's OK for the moment.

This is a portrait painted of me when I was married to John Ropner.

Anyway, I couldn't think why I had to be painted a specific size,

only to find I was put into the frame of John's first wife,

where he'd give her a portrait.

And when we, sadly, parted, he gave me the portrait but not the frame,

and history doesn't relate if the third wife

is in the same frame.

I used to, once upon a time in the dim and distant past, be a model,

which really annoyed my father intensely.

What might you be wanting up here, madam?

When Lady Linlithgow inherited Bryngwyn in 1987,

the Grade II listed house had been mothballed for over 50 years

and was practically derelict.

You know you're not really meant to come up here

unless specifically invited, don't you?

It was in the most appalling state.

There was dry rot everywhere, bats, mice, rats,

you name it. It was a complete haven for wildlife.

And the garden was in the most ghastly state.

But I had this great passion to want to restore this house.

It was very exciting, actually,

but financially it was extremely difficult!

Right...

Maintaining, let alone restoring,

this substantial Georgian house and its 60 acres of parkland

is costly.

I did this last night.

One's very, very lucky to have an estate,

but unless you're very, very, very rich, which I'm not,

you have to be prepared to get your feet dirty, like this.

I'm not doing very well here, am I? Have we got a stick anywhere?

No, I haven't!

There might be one behind that bush.

I like being hands-on.

I would be very bored

if I didn't have something to do like this.

The ducks usually kill those off.

I've got 150 coming.

HEY! Come here! Come here, you bloody dog!

Faith! Faith!

She just found a baby pheasant. Faith! Leave it!

Bad dog!

To fund the restoration and running of Bryngwyn,

Lady Linlithgow has turned it into a money-making enterprise.

Cook Christine Jones is one of five full-time staff

who have helped with the process.

We started doing tours of the house,

perhaps tea or lunch or whatever, and it's just gone on from there.

Then we decided to do shooting and...weddings!

What's the next?

Paranormal, I hear! Oh, my!

I was approached some years ago

as to whether I would let the house be used as a porn-movie location.

And that is a no-no, absolute no-no.

SHE LAUGHS

For international visitors to the UK,

Cardiff is one of their ten most popular cities.

This summer, with many of the 2012 Olympic football matches

being held in the capital,

its profile will be higher than ever.

So the city's crack cleansing team have gone into deep-clean mode.

Rose! Missed a bottle AND a can!

Team-mates Russell Davies and Rose Joseph

are working hard to ensure

that each and every part of the city centre looks its very best.

Got to have eyes everywhere.

You've got to watch the brushes, make sure there's no obstacles

in your way, lampposts, bins,

people who just step out from cars...

Even though the work can be tough,

the cleansing squad have a real team spirit.

She's in the way. She won't go up the tube - her bum's too big.

I think he's a bit scared of me.

He's my fourth driver.

No, I'm not a bully! I just wear them out.

For one team-mate, this is very much a family affair.

Working alongside her dad

as litter picker is Russell's 19-year-old daughter Sophie.

Well, I left school and my dad said there was jobs going,

so I just signed up to the agency, and that's how I got the job.

She's never been late, thank God, otherwise I'd get the blame for it,

for asking her to do the work.

If I do something wrong, then he's the first to tell me.

I want to do right by him, kind of thing.

And for a girl - she's only 19 - to do it, it's unusual.

I think there's only about three or four women

out litter picking or cleaning the streets.

People do tend to, like, assume you're a bloke,

just because of the job you're doing.

But I think that's just normal.

They don't expect to see girls doing a man's job, really, do they?

I like to think that he's proud, because I've stuck it out.

And I've got to enjoy it and I wouldn't give it up now.

I'd rather do this job than be stuck in an office or in a shop

doing something that I hate.

It's not a glamorous job, though!

But at the end of the day, if people didn't drop rubbish,

people like me wouldn't have a job.

Every public area is given a thorough clean,

from streets to parks and gardens.

Got to wear the leggings. Never know what you'll find.

It's a detergent-free liquid, it's pretty safe.

This lifts the grease, the spillages.

So when we jet it, the slabs come up as new.

As you can see and smell...lovely.

Glad to see we haven't seen rats this morning.

Used to be hundreds of them at one time, especially in the dark.

You'd see little eyes in the dark.

Even Cardiff's public art is being given a thorough scrub,

under the watchful eye of team manager Juliet Gamlin.

We've got some beautiful monuments in the city centre,

but unfortunately the seagulls like to rest on top of them.

They all go up, do their business and fly off,

so it's proper crusty now.

There's the culprit, guilty as charged.

Cardiff has one of the largest colonies of urban nesting gulls

in Britain, and it certainly shows.

People tend to feed the birds, so that actually encourages them

to come to this particular location.

Unfortunately, poor Mr Bevan suffers as a result.

Obviously because it's a bronze statue, it takes a little TLC,

so it has to be cleaned by hand.

Only trouble is, the suit says "dry clean only".

That's not so good, it might shrink.

Hopefully by the time they've finished,

it'll be back to his wonderful gleaming glory again.

That's looking lovely.

Much better. Huge improvement.

It just needs somebody to stand here now like a scarecrow,

keeping the birds away.

On their whistle-stop tour of north Wales, the cruise ship passengers

have taken to the railways, with the world's oldest independent company.

And there have been a few surprises.

I thought it would be flat! Wrong!

Beautiful scenery, beautiful.

A lot like some of the United States but a lot better.

Breathtaking views. Photographs, can't wait to get them out.

-It's really nice.

-Nice people.

Wales has 14 steam railways,

and they're one of our biggest tourist attractions.

Being this wide, on gauge, and looking down these cliffs,

it's more exciting than I thought it would be!

We'll be in Wales for about one day and it probably isn't enough,

so we'll have to plan to come back and visit this lovely country.

All aboard!

Even the wet Welsh weather isn't bothering them.

We get seven inches of rain a year in Arizona.

We're getting seven inches in probably a week here.

When you're from Magnolia, Texas, where it's 105 degrees right now...

When there's no rain and the trees are brown and dead!

The only thing we knew about Wales was it was somewhere

over here in this area.

We knew absolutely nothing about it

and we just wanted to investigate it.

And to see what it was. And it is beyond our expectations.

I'm only in Wales for one day then I have to leave.

That doesn't mean I can't come back.

Tourism is big business in Wales.

But for many of the country's small attractions,

a bad summer season can be make or break.

Phil Talbot is a donkey man working Llandudno's West Shore.

Hold tight, kids.

Like his competitor, John Jones,

he too has to contend with rocks on the beach.

But he's come up with a solution.

Rather than lose valuable ride time, he's abandoned the beach

and instead takes his donkeys to meet the land train which is

packed full of families with young children.

-Business is brisk.

-Who's going on now then?

I'm 73, I started off when I was about nine or ten, with my uncle.

Tanner a ride when I first started, sixpence in the old money.

My uncle used to say, if they haven't got a sixpence,

take thruppence, but don't go so far with them.

But we always did.

Where are we going?

Phil has seen big changes with some of his customers

since he first started.

They weren't as heavy as they are nowadays.

I call them McDonalds kids cos they're a bit heavy

to put on the donkeys!

Sometimes they kick when you're still on them!

They have such a long lifespan. They live for donkey's years!

Back on the North Shore, it's low tide.

And with clear sand to play with,

John can finally get down to business.

There are plenty of customers, but Snowy the new donkey is playing up.

She won't go...

-How do you ride a donkey?

-This is how you ride a donkey!

Get into first gear, there we go.

John's mum helps out with the business, and she's concerned.

It's bad for everybody.

The way things are going now, the cost of keeping them

all winter, it's a big outlay.

Even the little ones we used to get years ago,

they're all in nursery schools now so you don't get them.

Plus we used to get a lot of school parties

but they won't go on now, for health and safety.

Despite the many problems, John is determined to battle on.

It gets into your blood.

You couldn't do anything better, could you really? Part of summer.

Part of British culture, it is, and we need to keep it going.

That's the way to do it, good girls. There you are.

The summer months at Bryngwyn Hall are a hectic

time for Lady Linlithgow.

But daily Pilates lessons help her deal with the strain.

Do you want to get the heart rate up,

do a bit of bouncing on the ball?

-Not really. Are you doing it too?

-Come on, darling.

-Go away!

-Come on, darling.

It certainly helps the stress.

There's a massive amount to do, the garden, the house.

The buck stops here, with me.

Today, the household is preparing for a dinner event.

A duster, OK.

Ben, could you be kind a give the table a bit of a rub up?

This table shows every mark.

I really enjoy this, I enjoy having people here.

I think, above everything, I really enjoy sharing Bryngwyn with people.

This is family silver which only comes out on high days and holidays.

So what have we got to eat? I think we'll be about eight.

-I haven't got a salmon in.

-What are salmon like at the moment?

-Expensive.

-Are they? Well, sensible without being stingy, aren't we?

We are.

And what we spend the most money on is meat,

on really good-quality meat and really good-quality fish.

And a huge sirloin with fillet in is expensive,

but some of our shooting guests love it

and they're regular customers and, of course, one gives them the best.

And then we pray they choose something cheap on the menu instead!

Courgettes or something!

It may be a constant battle, but for Lady Linlithgow,

securing Bryngwyn Hall's financial future is a labour of love.

Good girl. Is it your dinner time?

It's a costly operation keeping this house going.

There's always things that need attending to.

I feel a great responsibility,

I very much view myself that I don't own this place,

that I'm a custodian.

It's mine for my lifetime

and will be handed on to the next generation for their tenure.

And hopefully on again, we hope, depending on the taxman.

SHE LAUGHS

Welsh festival season may be under way,

but the weather isn't playing ball.

The heaviest rain is likely across north, mid and west Wales.

On north Wales' Llyn peninsula, Wakestock, Europe's largest

wakeboard and music festival, is off to a muddy start.

We could see two inches of rain.

The Met Office has an amber warning in place.

This will be Cafe Mor's second big Welsh festival of the summer.

They've never catered it before.

And Jonathan was worried how his food

and prices would go down with the young audience.

Quiet, we didn't take much. We take more at St David's Day market.

Seriously. Apparently all the stallholders are the same.

People have been coming to the stall saying, "Oh, this looks different.

"We'll come back tomorrow."

Or they've flung 12p on the counter and said,

"Can you do us anything for 12p?"

No, we can't.

Here comes Katie! Yes!

It looks like Jonathan's fears were well founded.

Worse, he's been unexpectedly delayed.

So for the last 24 hours, his mum's had to hold the fort.

He won the British Street Food Awards last year.

One of the prizes was a pitch at the Olympic Village,

the athletes' Olympic Village, which was absolutely fantastic

but it's like a double-edged sword. So much work.

And they've just finished making about 17,500 wraps in three weeks,

ready for the Olympics.

So at least he's got that done and he's really happy.

So that's added to the pressure this summer.

And also, him and his partner had a baby.

17th June.

-Meet Josie.

-Oh, she's gorgeous! Isn't she lovely?

She looks the spitting image of our Jonathan when he was born.

I'm "Yia-yia", Greek for granny. I'm called Yia-yia!

-Hi, guys.

-Hello!

-All right?

-Are you all right?

-Yeah. How's it been going?

-Slow.

We sold a few cakes, that's why they're out.

-What's that place called? Pwllheli.

-Yeah.

It's packed. They're all in ASDA, loading up.

I don't think it's going to be... It's going to be slow.

You ought to try and do a meal deal. A mini-wrap and a cake for £4.

Yeah.

Yeah, Wakestock!

In a last-ditch attempt to attract more customers,

Jonathan takes his mum's advice

and tweaks his menu to appeal to the teenagers' tight budget.

But there's still no takers.

This is the worst I've ever seen it at a festival.

It is the worst I've ever seen.

It's cos it's a completely different demographic.

They're all kids and when I was a kid,

I was quite happy drinking all day and dancing.

The majority of people here, that's what they want to do.

As night falls, Jonathan decides enough is enough.

Put it this way, I'd do better at a local market

for £15 a pitch than what I paid for here.

So we've decided to cut our losses really.

There's a big festival down in Aberaeron tomorrow.

We've got to be down in Aberaeron for 8am. It's not ideal.

I'm knackered, I want to go to bed

but I think we decided we'll just break out while we can.

Lesson learnt, Wakestock.

SHE SINGS

In Holyhead, the American cruise ship passengers have

finished their whirlwind tour of north Wales.

We loved every minute of it.

The castles, awesome, absolutely awesome.

-We saw the...

-SPEAKS GIBBERISH

..town!

And some lovely people.

The old-world flavour, the quaintness of the villages.

It's extremely green. It was just very enjoyable.

Everybody was so friendly, so nice. Just really a nice place to visit.

I could live in Wales.

That would be what I would plan to do.

Now they're off to "do" Ireland.

-Next time...

-Not the cleverest idea to try and take it down.

-Torrential rain hits Wales.

-It's fantastic.

-You can't beat it, can you?

-Couple of people chickened out.

-We're going to find a B&B.

-The WI descend on Bryngwyn Hall.

-Christine gets nervous when they're coming to tea.

-I'm making scones, which I hate!

And the writing's on the wall in Barry.

The park will close in 15 minutes.

-Times change and we've got to change with them.

-Very, very big shame.

We're not going to finish with the business, that doesn't happen.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd