The Discovery Centre

At the heart of the Coastal Park stands the iconic Discovery Centre, where visitors can find out all about the leisure attractions of Carmarthenshire in one of the county's most spectacular settings. Overlooking Llanelli beach and offering panoramic views of the Loughor estuary and the Gower peninsula, the Discovery Centre is both the first port of call for visitors and an ideal stop-off point for people travelling through the park (01554777744 discoverycentre@carmarthenshire.gov.uk).

Flanagans Coastline Café

Flanagans brings a flavour of the Riviera to the Millennium Coastal Park with its selection of continental coffees and pastries. The cafés menu also offers a range of light lunches, snacks and other drinks to cater for all visitor tastes and preferences. Flanagans is now attracting over 100,000 visitors a year and has become the premier meeting point for local people and the ideal place for park visitors to rest, relax and take in the wonderful views from the first floor of the Discovery Centre.

Millennium Kiosk

Ice cream lovers are spoilt for choice at the Discovery Centre's Millennium Kiosk. The huge selection of ice cream and ices means there's something to tempt the taste buds of all the park visitors, young or old. Customers are given the choice of purchasing their refreshments whilst on the move or relaxing on the patio furniture overlooking Llanelli beach. On a fine day the Millennium Kiosk really can take people to ice cream heaven!

A Parkland Paradise

One of the biggest successes of the Millennium Coastal Park has been the creation of wildlife habitats. So why not spend the day discovering some of the many fascinating plants and animals found within the park? There are many different habitats including sand dune, lake, salt marsh, fen, woodland, stream and semi-natural grasssland. Each habitat is home to a unique assemblage of plants and animals.

North Dock Dunes Local Nature Reserve, next to the Discovery Centre, is home to many specialist plants and animals that are adapted to withstand the dry sandy conditions. Look out for plants like sea holly, sea campion, sea spurge and grasses such as marram and sand couch grass. The rare marbled white and small blue butterfly also occur here.

From the cycle path on the Machynys peninsula there are good views over the mud flats of the Burry Inlet, which is internationally important for its bird life. The estuary is a Site of Special Scientific Interest and is within the Carmarthen Bay Special Area of Conservation. Look out for small flocks of dunlin, ringed plover, sanderling and redshank along the coast whilst shelduck, oystercatcher and curlew can be seen further out on the mudflats.

In the peace and quite of Pwll Lagoon Local Nature Reserve many rare plants can be found in this fenland habitat such as southern marsh orchid, common sundew and lesser centaury. In the more wooded areas royal fern and lemon-scented fern grow.

The semi-natural grassland is full of meadow flowers in summer along with the accompanying buzz of bees and other nectar feeding insects. Skylark and linnet both nest here along with numerous butterflies such as ringlet, meadow brown, gatekeeper, large skipper, peacock and red admiral.

At Ashpits Pond Local Nature Reserve there are high numbers of breeding birds such as swan, mallard, coot, moorhen, little grebe, great crested grebe and tufted duck. In the summer sand martin are found over the pond hawking for insects. Overwintering ducks include gadwall, shoveler, teal, pochard, wigeon and goldeneye.

Llanelli Beach

The Millennium Coastal Park is blessed with several stretches of golden shoreline including the Llanelli Beach. For many years the beach was a well kept secret known only to people living in the locality but the creation of the Coastal Park has made it a popular destination with visitors from near and far. Llanelli Beach is adjacent to the Park Centre and stretches approximately a mile along the northern shore of the Loughor Estuary. It is overlooked by the Discovery Centre and the stunning Seaside Promenade.