★ 4.7 · 890 reviews
Gigrin Farm near Rhayader is widely regarded as the best place in the UK to see and photograph wild red kites, with anywhere from 200 to 500 birds swooping in for a genuinely spectacular daily feed. It's a real conservation success story — in the early 1990s, when red kites were almost extinct in Britain, farmer Eithel Powell began putting out food for a pair roosting on his land at the RSPB's request; the farm became an official feeding station in 1992/93, and numbers have grown dramatically ever since. Feeding happens once a day at 2pm (GMT, October to March) or 3pm (during British Summer Time), with five large hides just metres from the action, three of them wheelchair accessible. Keep an eye out for the extremely rare leucistic (white) red kites that occasionally visit — the farm is one of only a handful of places in the world where they're regularly seen. There's a café, gift shop, picnic site and a farm walk to fill the rest of your visit, and dogs are welcome on short leads (though not in the coffee shop). It's genuinely worth the trip but is considerably further afield than most of our other recommendations — around 2 hours' drive from Tywyn through the heart of Mid Wales — so it's best combined with an overnight stay or planned as a full day out.
View on map ← All Nature & WalksStay Nearby