Driving and Parking in Pembrokeshire

Driving here is easy on the main roads and a completely different skill five minutes off them. The lanes are the reason people arrive frazzled, and the car parks are the reason they arrive somewhere and leave again.

Single-track lanes

Much of Pembrokeshire's minor road network is one car wide, walled with high earth banks and hedges, and blind for long stretches. You cannot see round the corner and neither can the person coming the other way.

The etiquette is simple and worth knowing before you need it.

Passing places are for passing, not parking. Never leave a car in one, even for two minutes and a photograph.

If the passing place is on your left, pull into it. If it's on your right, stop opposite it and let the other car come through the gap.

Whoever is nearer a passing place reverses. Not whoever feels most entitled. Reversing a hire car forty yards downhill is part of the holiday.

Slow right down at blind bends and gateways, and expect to meet something big at the worst possible point.

Raise a hand. Everyone does it, it costs nothing, and it makes the next mile more pleasant.

Farm traffic

This is working countryside. Tractors, trailers, milk lorries and slurry tankers use these lanes at all hours and have absolutely nowhere else to go. They are wider than you, they know the road, and they are at work while you are on holiday. Pull in early, wait, and don't try to squeeze past.

Mud on the road after field work is normal and slippery. So are sheep.

Speed limits in built-up areas across Wales are 20mph as standard. It is enforced.

The Cleddau bridge

The Cleddau estuary splits the county in two, and the bridge between Neyland and Pembroke Dock is the only crossing. There is no alternative except a long detour inland via Haverfordwest, which adds a substantial amount of time.

That makes it the pinch point between north and south Pembrokeshire. If you're staying near St Davids and planning a day at the southern beaches, or the reverse, factor the crossing in, and understand that any incident on the bridge means a genuinely long way round.

The practical conclusion: don't plan a week that crosses the estuary daily. Pick a side and go across occasionally.

Coastal car parks in summer

From July to September, the popular coastal car parks fill by mid-morning. Not "get busy" — fill, with a queue on the approach lane and nowhere to turn.

The pattern is consistent. Arrive before ten or after four. Before ten you park anywhere and get the beach at its best. After four you get a space as the day crowd leaves, and the light is better anyway.

Between those hours in August you are gambling, and if you lose you will be reversing back up a single-track lane past everyone who is also losing.

Some specifics worth knowing:

National Trust car parks serve several of the best places on the coast. Members park free with a valid card on display; everyone else pays.

Don't park on the verge or in a field gateway. Those gateways are the farm's access and blocking one is a real problem, not a technicality. Coastal villages have limited space and residents who need it.

The A487 at Newgale runs behind a shingle bank and can be closed by storms and high tides pushing the shingle across the road. Check before relying on it in bad weather.

Castlemartin range roads close when the red flags fly, which closes the Stack Rocks approach entirely. Check firing times before driving down.

Two small things

Fuel is sparser and dearer the further west you go, and some village stations keep short hours. Fill up in a town.

Electric charging is improving but thin outside the main towns, so plan the route rather than assuming a charger at the beach.

More in practical information, beaches or getting to Pembrokeshire.