Cardiff Castle tells you a lot about the city in one place. There is a Roman fort wall, a Norman keep on a mound, and, behind it, a fantastical Victorian palace designed by William Burges for the third Marquess of Bute, one of the richest men in Britain, whose money came from the coal that was shipped through the docks. In the nineteenth century, Cardiff was the world's biggest coal-exporting port, and it grew from a small town into a capital in a few decades. Wales formally recognised it as capital in 1955.
The city is compact and friendly. The Principality Stadium, the home of Welsh rugby, stands in the middle, and on match days the whole centre is a river of red shirts and singing. The old docks, once known as Tiger Bay, are now the Bay, with the Senedd, the Welsh parliament, and the Millennium Centre with its bronze roof, inscribed with lines of verse in Welsh and English. Llandaff, where Roald Dahl was born, has a quiet cathedral and a village green.
For riders, the day ahead is a long haul east, across the Severn estuary into England, then south-west through Somerset to the Dorset and East Devon coast, the so-called Jurassic Coast, where the cliffs reveal 185 million years of geology. The motorway is the quick way, but it is worth leaving it when you can. The Welsh valleys north of the city, with their steep terraced streets and the brooding hills above, are another day's ride, and the Brecon Beacons are an hour away.
Fuel is easy in the city and along the motorway. Welsh cakes, cooked on a griddle, and a bowl of cawl, a lamb and leek broth, are the local comforts. The weather is, as in most of Wales, changeable, so a waterproof layer is sensible even in summer. Leave before the commuter rush, since the M4 around Cardiff and the Severn crossing can be slow, and be ready for a long day in the saddle.