Magic Harbours (From Western Telegraph)

Magic Harbours

BBC Wales news anchorman Jamie Owen, whose family home is in Pembroke Dock, left the newsroom behind one summer's day and began a voyage around the coast of Wales, meeting the people who live and work by the sea. In a hundred-year-old sailing ship, Mascotte, he and the crew sailed around stunning coastline - including Jamie's home patch of Pembrokeshire. The whole adventure became one of BBC Wales' most popular television series - Jamie Owen's Magic Harbours - and the accompanying book - lavishly illustrated with stunning photographs from another Pembroke Dock 'boy' Martin Cavaney, topped the Welsh bestseller list over Christmas. To mark the publication of the softback edition of the book here is an extract of Jamie's adventures around the beautiful Pembrokeshire coast, accompanied by some of Martin's amazing photographs. A wonderful afternoon's sailing in bright sunshine from Tenby to Milford, past Penally, Caldey Island, Priest's Nose, Manorbier Castle, Swanlake Bay, Freshwater East, Barafundle and Broadhaven. Near St Govan's Head the range boat from Castlemartin comes alongside and orders us to change course - sending us two miles off shore to avoid the firing practice from the land. I've never been this close to the coastline here; the sandstone and limestone Stack Rocks are spectacular. There are no yachts here, no other craft in sight. If this were the south coast of England, the water would be heaving with sailing boats. Not that I wish for that, but the Essex boys, Tony, Will and Paul, are silent witnesses to the beauty of this stretch of coast and mystified as to why we don't make more of our extraordinary asset. St Govan's Head and its tiny chapel pass slowly by. Govan was a hermit who devoted himself to a life of prayer, choosing a spectacular setting halfway down this cliffside for his cell. But he was also concerned for the safety of mariners and legend has it that he rang a bell to warn ships of the treacherous rocks near the headland, and often helped shipwrecked sailors to safety. Pirates and wreckers were none too pleased with his interference, and plotted to murder him. The saintly Govan fled and hid in a crevice in the rocks. There's a steady breeze and soon Saddle Head, Moody Nose and Bullslaughter Bay disappear behind us. We are heading for Freshwater West beach to look at the seaweed hut where laverbread was processed a century ago. Once there were a dozen huts here, reminders of a time when we ate everything the seaside had to offer; now there's just one left. Up-market restaurants make a big thing of dishes with laverbread now, but it has disappeared from most of our plates, a victim of the supermarket culture.

Milford Haven's refinery chimneys puncture the sky, while Monk Rock, Parsonsquarry Bay, Sheep Island, Rat Island and Thorn Island all lie ahead of us. West Angle Beach is packed with families lying in the sun. At four o'clock, off Freshwater West, with the Castlemartin peninsula fading behind us, Dale and Angle come into view on either side of the estuary, and we enter Milford Haven. The frantic concentration in this narrow funnel of water of ferries, tankers, tugs, speedboats and fishermen is something of a shock after the solitude of the day's sail in open sea. Nelson described Milford as one of the greatest harbours in the world and Daniel Defoe was similarly generous, calling it one of the best inlets in Britain. George Owen (no relation), writing in the sixteenth century, said it was 'a large and spacious harbour sufficient to receive the greatest vessel of whatsoever burden that saileth on the seas.' The defensive forts built in Napoleonic times must have turned this stretch of river into a snipers' alley that would give an enemy vessel entering the Haven no chance at all. As it happened, the enemy never came, at least not here. In the nineteenth century, pioneering American Quaker whalers sailed into Milford with whale oil to be used to light up London. The town of Milford was built around a grid system, like Pembroke Dock on the other side of the river, and its development as a town was eclipsed by Pembroke Dock's rise. Nonetheless, Milford became an important fishing port, reaching its height in the 1920s when thousands were employed in the industry. In the post-war years, fishing declined, but then came the oil industry boom, particularly following the Suez crisis. The landscape today on both sides of the river is dominated by massive refinery chimneys and jetties.

Wednesday 0600 Milford Docks Bleary-eyed, we prepare ourselves for the jaunt to the electronic fish market. A trawler arriving from the Bristol channel, Ster Der Zee, makes its way through the lock gate and minutes later ties up alongside us. In a well-rehearsed routine, an articulated truck parks up, ready to load fish bound for Belgium. The ship's skipper, Coolsaet Dirk, has been in the business for 23 years and looks how a trawler skipper should look: bearded and menacing. On his first trips to Wales, he tells us, Milford had dozens of trawlers but now there are only a handful.