Freshwater West

Freshwater West is the county at its most elemental: a huge west-facing strand of sand and dunes taking the full Atlantic, with the best (and most powerful) surf in Wales rolling in. Film crews love it — Russell Crowe's Robin Hood stormed ashore here and Dobby the house-elf is "buried" in the dunes, a shrine visitors still maintain — and surfers rate it the country's premier break.

Respect it: rips and shore dump make it unsafe for casual swimming (the RNLI is explicit), and dogs are welcome year-round precisely because it's a walking-and-watching beach more than a bathing one. On the headland, a little seaweed-drying hut recalls the laverbread trade. Nearby Angle village adds the sheltered East Angle Bay and the Old Point House pub for calm-water days.

There's no village at Freshwater West itself — accommodation sits in Angle, Castlemartin and the farms around — which keeps it gloriously undeveloped.

Angle village (ten minutes) for pubs and shelter; farm cottages around Castlemartin for space, dark skies and the surf ten minutes away. A car is essential.