Dylan Thomas Birthday Walk

1.9 miles (3 km)

This waymarked walk visits the Carmarthenshire town of Laugharne, former home of poet Dylan Thomas.
The walk was created by Bob Stevens to "help promote Dylan Thomas's poetry and for more people to while away their own birthdays". The walk pays tribute to Dylan's "Poem in October" which describes his birthday walk to the shoulder of St John's Hill. You can see the poem in full below.
You can start your walk from the Dylan Thomas boathouse. The house is very photogenic, being set in a cliff overlooking the estuary. It was at this house that he wrote many major pieces including part of 'Under Milk Wood'. The house now serves as a museum which is�open to the public for most of the year.
You then follow the coast path past the historic Laugharne Castle and along Railsgate Pill before finishing at St John's Hill. Along the way there's lovely coastal scenery, views of the River Coran and lots of wildlife to look out for on the water. There's also handy information boards with more details about Thomas and the area.

Please click here for more information

Dylan Thomas Birthday Walk Ordnance Survey Map - view and print off detailed OS map

Dylan Thomas Birthday Walk Open Street Map - view and print off detailed map

Dylan Thomas Birthday Walk OS Map - Mobile GPS OS Map with Location tracking

Dylan Thomas Birthday Walk Open Street Map - Mobile GPS Map with Location tracking

Further Information and Other Local Ideas

Poem in October



It was my thirtieth year to heaven

Woke to my hearing from harbour and neighbour wood

And the mussel pooled and the heron

Priested shore

The morning beckon

With water praying and call of seagull and rook

And the knock of sailing boats on the webbed wall

Myself to set foot

That second

In the still sleeping town and set forth.



My birthday began with the water-

Birds and the birds of the winged trees flying my name

Above the farms and the white horses

And I rose

In a rainy autumn

And walked abroad in shower of all my days

High tide and the heron dived when I took the road

Over the border

And the gates

Of the town closed as the town awoke.



A springful of larks in a rolling

Cloud and the roadside bushes brimming with whistling

Blackbirds and the sun of October

Summery

On the hill's shoulder,

Here were fond climates and sweet singers suddenly

Come in the morning where I wandered and listened

To the rain wringing

Wind blow cold

In the wood faraway under me.



Pale rain over the dwindling harbour

And over the sea wet church the size of a snail

With its horns through mist and the castle

Brown as owls

But all the gardens

Of spring and summer were blooming in the tall tales

Beyond the border and under the lark full cloud.

There could I marvel

My birthday

Away but the weather turned around.



It turned away from the blithe country

And down the other air and the blue altered sky

Streamed again a wonder of summer

With apples

Pears and red currants

And I saw in the turning so clearly a child's

Forgotten mornings when he walked with his mother

Through the parables

Of sunlight

And the legends of the green chapels



And the twice told fields of infancy

That his tears burned my cheeks and his heart moved in mine.

These were the woods the river and the sea

Where a boy

In the listening

Summertime of the dead whispered the truth of his joy

To the trees and the stones and the fish in the tide.

And the mystery

Sang alive

Still in the water and singing birds.



And there could I marvel my birthday

Away but the weather turned around. And the true

Joy of the long dead child sang burning

In the sun.

It was my thirtieth

Year to heaven stood there then in the summer noon

Though the town below lay leaved with October blood.

O may my heart's truth

Still be sung

On this high hill in a year's turning.