Holiday Cottages In Cardiff

Cardiff has a small, central set of self-catering cottages and apartments on selfcatering.co.uk, around a dozen at the moment, most in the city and its leafy western suburbs. This is the Welsh capital, a compact and walkable base with a famous castle, a regenerated waterfront at Cardiff Bay and a strong line in sport, music and museums.

Best areas and towns in Cardiff

Cardiff is a city and a county in its own right, so almost all of its self-catering places sit within the city boundary rather than in separate towns. The handful on offer are spread between the centre, the waterfront and the greener suburbs to the west and north-west.

• Butetown: the waterfront district around Cardiff Bay, walkable to the Wales Millennium Centre and the old docks
• Grangetown: a lively inner-city district just west of the bay, by the River Taff and Cardiff Bay barrage
• Radyr: a green, well-to-do suburb a few miles north-west of the centre, beside the Taff and its own railway station
• Llanrumney: a residential district in the east of the city, handy for the main roads in and out
• Pentyrch: a village on the rural western edge of the city, where the suburbs give way to farmland and hills
• Saint Fagans: a village in the west, best known for the open-air national museum that fills its old estate

The centre and the bay are the obvious base for a first visit, within easy reach of the castle, the stadium and the waterfront, while Radyr, Pentyrch and St Fagans offer quieter, leafier streets a short drive or train ride out.

Cardiff, the bay and the city parks

Cardiff is a coastal capital, though it is a city of docks and a barrage rather than beaches. The River Taff runs down through the centre to Cardiff Bay, once the tidal mouth of the river and now a large freshwater lake held back by a barrage, ringed by the Wales Millennium Centre and the rebuilt waterfront of the old coal docks. The city is unusually green: a long chain of parks follows the Taff from the centre out to the suburbs, taking in Sophia Gardens beside the cricket ground, the broad lawns and lake of Roath Park, and Forest Farm Country Park on the city's north-western edge. Out west, the wooded grounds of Insole Court and the estate at St Fagans give more room to roam, with the open farmland of Pentyrch and the hills beyond marking the edge of the city.

Things to do in Cardiff

Cardiff Castle sits right in the centre, a Roman fort and Norman keep wrapped in the lavish Victorian fantasy added by the Bute family, and it is the city's single biggest draw. A few miles west, St Fagans National Museum of History is one of Europe's leading open-air museums, where dozens of historic Welsh buildings have been rebuilt across a parkland estate around St Fagans Castle, an Elizabethan manor. In the city itself, Llandaff Cathedral stands in its own quiet green close on the Taff, Insole Court is a restored Victorian gothic mansion with free gardens, and the Museum of Cardiff tells the story of the city in the old library. For green space and a boating lake, Roath Park with its lighthouse memorial is a city favourite, and the bay is the place for waterfront walks, a boat trip and the Millennium Centre's shows.

When to visit Cardiff

Cardiff is a year-round city break, but it is liveliest on the big match days at the Principality Stadium, when rugby and football fill the centre, and through the summer festival season around the bay. Late spring and summer show the parks and the waterfront at their best. Autumn is quieter and pleasant for walking the Taff trail and the city gardens, and winter brings markets, museums and indoor culture, along with the busiest run of stadium events. Midweek stays outside the major fixtures tend to be the best value.

Dog-friendly and hot-tub cottages in Cardiff

Seven of the cottages in Cardiff take dogs, and one has a hot tub.

Getting to Cardiff

Cardiff sits on the south coast of Wales, where the M4 from London and the Severn crossings runs along the northern edge of the city, about two hours from the capital by road. Cardiff Central is the main railway station, with direct trains to London Paddington in under two hours and frequent services along the South Wales main line and the Valley Lines into the city. Cardiff Airport lies west of the city in the Vale of Glamorgan, with Bristol Airport another option a little over an hour away across the Severn.

Useful links

• Visit Cardiff
• Cardiff Council
• Cardiff Castle
• St Fagans National Museum of History

Cardiff is the capital and largest city of Wales, set on the south coast where the Rivers Taff, Ely and Rhymney reach the Severn Estuary, with the Vale of Glamorgan to the west and the old mining valleys rising to the north. It grew from a small town beside a Norman castle into the greatest coal-exporting port in the world during the nineteenth century, and the wealth of those docks built much of the city that stands today.

The waterfront is central to its character. The tidal mouth of the Taff at Cardiff Bay has been dammed by a barrage to form a large freshwater lake, its old coal wharves rebuilt as the Wales Millennium Centre, the Senedd and a ring of waterside homes, bars and galleries. Inland lies a compact and unusually green city centre, where Cardiff Castle stands in its own walled park beside the shops and the Principality Stadium, and a string of parks follows the Taff north past Sophia Gardens and Bute Park towards the leafier suburbs of Llandaff, Radyr and Pentyrch. The cathedral city of Llandaff sits within the modern boundary, and the village of St Fagans to the west holds the national open-air museum.

Cardiff has been a centre of power and trade since Roman times, when a fort guarded the river crossing, but its modern shape was forged by coal, iron and the Marquesses of Bute who owned the docks. Since becoming the recognised capital of Wales in 1955 and the seat of the Senedd, it has grown into the civic, sporting and cultural heart of the country, known for its rugby, its music and its festivals.