I'd come up to North Wales via the A5 and then over the Pass of Llanberis to Caernarfon and then up the south shore of the Menai Strait. My first port of call was to be the newer of the two bridges - the Britannia Bridge of Robert Stephenson, built presumably for some light relief following the strain of writing Kidnapped. "Are you sure about this?"...ed.

Of course it isn't the same bridge as the one that Stephenson built for the Chester and Holyhead Railway in 1850. That was a magnificent structure that was so simple in its conception. Stephenson simply constructed two massive tubes and floated them down the Menai Strait. When they arrived at the site they were lifted them into position with the limestone piers being built underneath them as they rose, just in case the hydraulic jacks failed.

To give you some idea of how wise a precaution this was, and how good the design and building were, one end did collapse, but the tube fell just 9 inches onto the masonry support.

The original intention was to support the tubes by chains, but the whole structure was so rigid once it had been assembled that the chains were deemed unnecessary and were never fitted.

The bridge lasted until 1970 when it was destroyed in dramatic fashion. A couple of teenagers, looking for bats with a flaming torch, accidentally dropped it, so we are told. Apparently these youths didn't think to stamp out the torch, or maybe there was a secret store of petrol or something hidden inside the tubes, for the bridge erupted into a blazing furnace.

The application of severe heat can have immense consequences to an iron structure. The heat movement transmits stress lines through the structure and can cause unexpected and hidden faults. So as a result of the blaze it was decided to the bridge. If you want to see what it looked like in all its glory, Stephenson built another tubular bridge 20 or so miles away at Conwy and that hasn't yet been burnt down by arsonists.

It was round about this time that the North Wales Coast Road - the A55 between Chester and nearby Bangor - was being updated. So anticipating the upgrading of the main A5 from Bangor to Holyhead, the planners decided to put in an upper deck to take a wider road across the Menai Straits, as the old Menai Bridge, which we will go to see in a moment, was groaning under the strain. In 1972 the new arched double-decker bridge was reopened.

Mind you, in some respects we were lucky that there was the pressure for this additional road bridge, even if it did destroy Stephenson's masterpiece. British Rail was engaged in a ruthless, savage process of hacking off as much of the railway network as it could. The magnificent Waverley Line had gone in 1969, and that other great trunk route, the Leeds-Settle-Carlisle line was under threat. BR was employing all sorts of dirty tricks in its campaigns, many of whch you can read about in this book and also this one. The blaze in the Britannia Bridge must have been a gift from the gods, and who can blame conspiracy theorists from suspecting a "Jewish Fire"?

It's probably only down to the demands of the road lobby that the bridge was repaired for rail traffic. It's quite easy, knowing what went on in railway circles during the 1950s and 60s to picture the line west of Bangor closing indefinitely.

I'll be back to have a closer look at the Britannia Bridge when I have more time because there is lots to see - especially the lions. These lions are quite famous and a poem was written about them by the legendary local Welsh poet John Evans -
   "Pedwar llew tew heb ddim blew
    Dau 'rochr yma a dau 'rochr drew"
Translated from the original Welsh by yours truly in his own inimitable style, we have -
   "Four fat lions without any fur
    There's two over 'ere and two over thur"

Having dealt with the Britannia Bridge for now, why don't we have a wander over to the Menai Bridge?

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