Independent Coffee in a Medieval Town
Conwy Quay — Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0
Conwy has no chain cafes within the medieval walls. Every coffee shop is independent, and the quality has risen sharply over the past decade as the town has attracted a more discerning visitor base. The settings alone are worth the price of a cup — thick stone walls, low-beamed interiors, views onto medieval streets with the castle at the end of them. Eating a slice of Welsh cake in a 16th-century building while planning a walk along the town walls is one of those simple pleasures that no amount of five-star hotel lobbies can replicate.
L's Coffee and Bookshop
L's Coffee and Bookshop on the High Street is the standout café within the walls. It combines good barista coffee with a secondhand book collection and a menu that runs from pastries and cakes through to cooked breakfasts and lunches. The full breakfast here is a proper one — generous, well-sourced ingredients, cooked carefully rather than thrown at a plate. It is dog friendly, relaxed about people sitting for a while, and has the easy, unhurried atmosphere of a café that knows what it is doing. Many visitors who stay overnight in Conwy find themselves returning here every morning. The Aberconwy House second-hand bookshop, a short walk away on Castle Street, is open Thursday to Saturday and makes a natural pairing for a browse after your coffee.
For serious specialty coffee a short distance from Conwy, Providero in Llandudno Junction — about a ten-minute drive — is widely regarded as one of the best cafés in the region. The beans are freshly roasted, the barista preparation is excellent, and the food is homemade and good. If you are driving through Llandudno Junction at any point during your stay, it is well worth stopping.
What to Order
Welsh rarebit — a rich, savoury cheese sauce made with Welsh ale, poured over good toast — appears on many Conwy café menus and is worth ordering for lunch if you have not encountered it before. It is a genuinely distinctive dish, very different from cheese on toast, and the best versions in Conwy use local cheese and a proper Welsh ale in the sauce. Welsh cakes are the universal local sweet treat: cooked on a griddle, spiced with currants and mixed spice, and best eaten warm from the pan if you can get them that way. Bara brith — a richly spiced fruit loaf soaked in tea — is another Welsh speciality worth ordering with butter.
Coffee quality has risen considerably across the town and most of the better cafés now source properly and serve properly. A decent flat white or filter coffee is no longer a surprise in Conwy; it is the expectation. For those who prefer tea, several cafés still serve it in a proper pot with milk in a jug, which is a small but genuine pleasure.
Café at RSPB Conwy
The RSPB Conwy nature reserve, a short drive or cycle from the town centre on the estuary side, has its Waterside Coffee Shop open daily 10am–4:30pm (4pm in winter). It is a pleasant stop whether or not you are visiting for the birdwatching — good coffee, simple food, and the opportunity to watch estuary birds from the window without needing to head out to the hides. Little egrets, various ducks and waders, and occasional rarities are visible from the café without needing to go out on the hides at all. It is a calmer, more spacious option than the town-centre cafes and worth bearing in mind if you have children who need space to decompress mid-walk.
See also our guides to restaurants in Conwy and where to have breakfast.
Day trips