By Train
Holyhead ferry terminal — Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0
Holyhead is the terminus of the North Wales Coast Line, and unusually well connected for a town its size: direct Avanti West Coast trains from London Euston (via Crewe and Chester) and Transport for Wales services from Cardiff, Manchester and along the coast through Llandudno Junction and Bangor. The station stands adjacent to the ferry terminal, linked to the town by the Celtic Gateway footbridge — boat-train connections remain the point of the place, 175 years on.
By Road
The A55 North Wales Expressway ends at the port — dual carriageway all the way from Chester, crossing to Anglesey on the Britannia Bridge and to Holy Island on the A55’s causeway beside Telford’s historic Stanley Embankment. Reckon: Chester 1 hr 40, Liverpool 2 hrs, Manchester 2 hrs 20, Birmingham 3 hrs 15. Sat-nav for the town centre: LL65 1UR (Market Street area); the port is signed from the final roundabouts. National Express coaches serve the port for Irish connections.
By Sea — and Onward
A Stena Line ferry passing North Stack near Holyhead — Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0
From the west, of course, Holyhead needs no introduction: up to eight daily Dublin sailings — the full picture is in our Port & Ferry guide. Arriving without a car? The car-free guide covers island buses and taxis; cruise visitors have their own page. However you come, the approach over the water or the causeway, with the mountain rising ahead, tells you you’ve reached somewhere that has always been an arrival.
The Scenic Arrival
Engineer the approach if you can: by rail, the coast line’s last miles run the shore with Snowdonia stacked across the water — sit on the left heading west — before crossing the Stanley Embankment with sea on both sides. By road, the A55’s final causeway sweep past the embankment delivers the same reveal, mountain dead ahead. Arrivals by sea get the definitive version: the breakwater’s long arm, the mountain behind the town, Wales assembling itself off the bow. All three beat any airport.
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