The third in our new series of day trips and weekends away covers a place that is close to our heart: North Wales.

North Wales is the sort of place it’s easy to overlook. It’s all wet hills and rundown seaside towns, right? Well, yes and no. Sure, the place has hills and a surfeit of rain and, yes, there are a few seafront resorts that have seen better days. Yet North Wales supplies spectacular scenery, curious architecture and the sort of ruddy-cheeked seaside charm it’s hard not to like. It provides an idiosyncratic backdrop to events such as Festival Number 6, has roads that remain relatively quiet (Bank Holidays aside), and is within easy striking distance of Manchester, Liverpool and Chester.

It supplies spectacular scenery, curious architecture & a ruddy-cheeked charm it’s hard not to like

With all of that in mind, we asked our friends at travel site Road, Rail & Sea to help us draw up a road trip through North Wales. They came up with a weekend’s drive that takes in five Welsh towns and features castle stop-offs, country walks, antiques shops, waterfalls and contemporary art. It’s a route that begins in Betws-y-Coed and moves through Porthmadog, Portmeirion and Caernarfon, before ending on the beaches of Llandudno.They also gave us tips as to where to find the best bara brith and fish and chips – you can read the resulting Weekend in North Wales guide now.

This road trip is one of our new series of day trip and weekend guides; we recently published a guide to Glasgow International and to the art-stuffed city of Wakefield. More are planned, with quite a few being cooked up between us and Road, Rail & Sea. This online magazine focuses on trips throughout the UK and Europe – that can only be taken, as the name suggests, by road, rail and sea. It’s the sort of old-fashioned, gentle travel that we think suits a place like North Wales – but don’t take our word for it. Take a look at our guide.