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Set amid thrilling
countryside, Blaenavon bears the scars of Wales’
own industrial revolution and its landscape has
been declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site. In
fact, the area is a giant, open-air heritage
museum.
Blaenavon Iron Works - Photo:
Cedwyn Davies
CCL |
The area was
blessed with an ironworks established as long
ago as 1757. Then coalmining started a few
years later. Much of the sprawling iron
factory can still be visited. Alternatively,
there are tours of the coalface, some 300 feet
below ground, at the nearby Big Pit Museum.
The pit itself existed for a century before
closing in 1980.
The writer Alexander Cordell set his famous
20th century novel ‘Rape of the Fair Country’
around Blaenavon and his life is celebrated at
Blaenavon’s Heritage and Cordell Museum. |
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