We’d barely made it off the ferry at Holyhead before the sat-nav decided we were better off taking the scenic route, which is how we ended up lost on a single-track lane with a trailer reversing towards us at alarming speed. By the time we’d squeezed past and found the right turning, the sun was already sliding behind the hills and my stomach was making noises that could only be described as urgent. Pistyll Ddu appeared at the end of a quiet lane just as the last light was fading, a tidy little white cottage with a view straight over the dunes to the sea. We tumbled out, grabbed the keys from the lockbox, and made straight for the fridge like shipwreck survivors.

Inside was the usual welcome pack—milk, bread, butter and a packet of Welsh cakes that disappeared before the kettle had even boiled. After a quick unpack we wandered down the footpath to the beach pub, the one locals call “the Ship” though its proper name is longer and nobody bothers with it. The bar was already busy with people shaking sand from their shoes and ordering pints. We squeezed onto stools by the window and ordered the seafood platter: crab claws, cockles, mussels in a garlicky broth and thick slices of soda bread. It arrived steaming and we fell on it like we hadn’t eaten for days, which, given the ferry queue, wasn’t far from the truth.

Next morning the plan had been a civilised breakfast in the garden, but the weather had other ideas and we ended up cooking inside with the patio doors wide open. I’d bought bacon and eggs from the little shop in the village and was feeling quietly confident until the first rasher hit the pan and immediately welded itself to the bottom. While I was scraping it off, the toast decided to make a break for freedom and landed butter-side down on the floor. We ate the survivors standing up, laughing at the mess and promising ourselves we’d do better at the next meal.

By lunchtime the tide was out and we followed the smell of frying onions to the little Saturday market in the car park behind the lifeboat station. Stalls offered laverbread, cockles in paper cones, and fresh crab sandwiches that we carried back to the cottage and ate on the bench overlooking the water. Later we tried our hand at a proper Welsh rarebit using the local cheese and a splash of ale left over from the night before. It came out bubbling and slightly scorched at the edges, but tasted so good we didn’t bother with plates, just tore chunks off the loaf and mopped up the sauce straight from the dish.

That evening we wandered back to the Ship for their pie night. I chose the beef and ale, she went for the leek and potato, and we shared chips that arrived in a basket the size of a small boat. Halfway through the meal the guitarist started up and the whole bar joined in on the chorus of “Calon Lân,” which felt exactly right after two days of eating, laughing and making a gentle hash of everything we touched. Sitting there with sand still in my shoes and gravy on my sleeve, I realised the cottage hadn’t needed to be perfect; it just needed to give us somewhere warm to come back to after all the small disasters and even smaller triumphs of trying to feed ourselves by the sea.