The Wye Valley: The UK’s First Tourist Destination – Travel Review
By Kevin Pilley, January 2025
In 1770, the Cumberland-born Rev. William Gilpin, while headmaster of Cheam School in Surrey, undertook a tour of Monmouthshire’s Wye Valley and wrote a book about it, Observations on the River Wye and Several Parts of South Wales, published in 1782. It became the first tourist guide and holiday brochure, inviting readers “to examine the face of the country by the rules of picturesque beauty.”
Before that, Dr. John Egerton, Rector of Ross-on-Wye and son of the Bishop of Hereford, had already started giving river cruises in his specially built boat. That boat turned into a fleet of eight and then thirty local private pleasure boat businesses. Ross’s Hope and Anchor pub and the sixteenth-century Saracen’s Head at Symonds Yat became the world’s first river cruise terminals.
The Lower Wye Valley, on the English-Welsh border, became the birthplace of British tourism, both on land and on the river.
Improved road communications and travel restrictions in continental Europe produced a spike in British domestic tourism in the 1780s and 1790s. Victorian “tourists” were issued the first walking route maps, printed by Heath’s of Monmouth. They walked 35 miles in two days from Ross-on-Wye to Chepstow to see the harvest moon rise through Tintern Abbey’s east window. Wordsworth was inspired by the views at Whitestone and Cleddon, stating: “No poem of mine was composed under circumstances more pleasant for me to remember than this.”
“Romantic scenes”
The first package holidays included stops at Martridge Meadow to visit the Piercefield Estate and landscaped park (Coleridge described the view as “the whole world imaged in its vast circumference”) as well as the Norman Goodrich Castle. The approach to the castle, however, was deemed by some as “too incommodious for well-dressed women.” Other highlights included Lover’s Leap and the Giant’s Rock viewing platform.
Visitors were advised: “Bring some gunpowder and leave it with Mr. Morris’s gardener in order to fire some small cannon on the Rock as you pass by. The reverberating echo of which you will find has a wonderful effect.” At one time, a stone giant stood above the cave entrance, holding a huge boulder as if about to hurl it at walkers below. Over time, the giant and his boulder suffered from frost damage and crumbled away.
Excursions also included Llanthony Abbey and the Kymin’s 1794 Summerhouse and 1801 Naval Temple, which were visited by Nelson. Early tourists and river cruisers picnicked on the Coldwell Rocks and visited Wales’s first stone-built castle at Chepstow (top image), the romantic ruins of Wilton Castle, and the iron foundries that “brought animation to the romantic scenes.”
The area attracted “topographical artists” like Turner. Some argue that Gilpin (1724–1804), who also produced a guidebook on the Lake District, is the father of Instagram. He defined the picturesque as “that kind of reality which is agreeable in a picture.” He preferred his pictures to be “charmingly grouped.”
The Wye Valley has been designated an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) since 1971
“Privileged activities”
From March to October, Celtic Trails offers easy/moderate three-day, four-night self-guided Rev. Gilpin’s Picturesque Beauty and Landscape Appreciation Walking Tours, starting at £490.
You can also enjoy an hour-long river cruise on the Kingfisher or Wye Pride. At just £10, it’s a bargain for the oldest historic and most picturesque river cruise in the world! Today, bow haulers are not required, and although there are no coracles or flat-bottomed “trows” to be seen on the river anymore, you’ll still witness “the most perfect river views.”
Gilpin, who also wrote a guide to the gardens at Stowe, Buckinghamshire, and a guidebook with aquatints on the Lake District, developed a set of rules for defining “the picturesque,” creating an artistic movement with a lasting impact on landscape appreciation.
In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, doing the Wye Tour was one of the most luxurious and privileged activities. With the advent of railways, tourism increased. In those days, visitors strolled along the Prospect promenade and stayed at Ross’s Royal Hotel (which had special steps built down to the River Wye “for the elegantly dressed”), The King’s Head in Monmouth’s Agincourt Square, and The George in Chepstow, which William Thackeray described as “one of the cleanest, friendliest, fresh salmon-giving inns.”
Tintern Abbey
“Picturesque”
Sadly, the same cannot be said for all these places today. For a modern stay, you can rent a cottage or visit Roger and Marta Brook’s acclaimed B&B and restaurant at Parva Farmhouse, where you can sample contemporary Welsh classics like Wye Valley asparagus, mushroom Scotch quail’s egg with paprika sauce, or mutton sausage with lentils and spinach. Desserts include Alphonso mango kulfi, coconut rice pudding, and vanilla crème brûlée with Gariguette strawberries.
Before or after following in the Reverend’s footsteps—whether by foot, boat, canoe, kayak, or SUP—consider the early days of tourism. Visitors once brought along sketching pads, telescopes, pocket editions of the Complete Works of William Cowper, and Claude glasses.
The Claude Glass, a convex mirror, reflected the landscape so that detail was lost except in the foreground, helping painters simplify their compositions. Many tourists used the glasses to manipulate the scene: a sunrise glass used at midday gave a dawn-like view. As Gilpin noted, “The picturesque practice always involved some ‘improvement’ of the landscape.”
But don’t follow all his advice—he once infamously suggested that “a mallet judiciously used” might render the insufficiently ruinous gable of Tintern Abbey more picturesque.
Useful links:
www.kingfishercruise.co.uk
www.visitrossonwye.com
www.visitherefordshire.co.uk
www.celtictrailswalkingholidays.co.uk
