Bluestone Country

 

There was a sad event last night -- the winding up dinner of the Preseli Tourist Association, after 43 years of promoting NE Pembrokeshire as a tourist destination and trying to sell the unique character of the landscape and its history.  Over the years we have had tremendous support from the Welsh Govt and from the local authorities, and as a membership-based organization we have supported those involved in the tourist trade, held literally hundreds of talks, site visits and specialist meetings (and convivial social gatherings!), lobbied government,  designed out own promotional campaigns, and produced our own leaflets, maps and web sites. We have never employed anybody -- everything has been funded through membership subs and small grants for specific projects.

But times have changed. When we started, Preseli District Council was our local government admin area, with its HQ in Haverfordwest.  Then came Dyfed CC -- it came and it went away again.  Patterns of holidaymaking have changed, people now get their information via the web, and Visit Wales and Visit Pembrokeshire use all the latest marketing techniques to compete with other tourism areas to attract future visitors. Small "regional" or "sub-regional" marketing exercises don't really have a role any more.  So effectively the PTA has become redundant, having done its job over many years -- just like Eco Centre Wales, which I founded back in 1980 and which promoted energy conservation and renewable energy for 35 years until it was wound up in 2015.

Bluestone Country was our brand -- based of course on the idea that this where the Stonehenge bluestones came from and covering the area across which the Fishguard Volcanic Group rocks are exposed at the surface.  Of course the landscape is unique too -- dominated by Mynydd Preseli and rougher and stonier than the landscapes to the south and west.  Over the years PTA produced a number of leaflets and maps extolling the virtues of the area.

Now, of course the branding label has been stolen from us -- we have the huge Bluestone National Park holiday resort in mid-Pembrokeshire, Bluestone Brewery and assorted other bits of branding as well, not to mention Australia and the USA, which have their own "bluestone branded areas".  Such is life......

Ironically, the Bluestone resort is not in the National Park, and neither is it in an area where bluestone rocks occur -- except as glacial erratics.....