The Carew Inn sits on Picton Terrace directly opposite the castle, which means you can eat a Sunday roast while looking at a Norman fortress across the road. Mandy and Rob Scourfield have run it for over 26 years. It's a free house in CAMRA's Good Beer Guide, with rotating draught ales, and the food goes well past pub staples: the Carew Inn Burger comes loaded with pulled pork and caramelised onions, there's a 10oz sirloin with onion rings, two seabass fillets with salsa verde, lamb rump, three-bean chilli, belly pork. One TripAdvisor reviewer called the Sunday dinners "the best in Pembrokeshire." Reservations are advised for Sunday lunch, and given the view, that seems fair.
There's a shady front terrace facing the castle, a sunny garden round the back, a marquee for when Pembrokeshire does what Pembrokeshire does, a children's play area and summer BBQs. Dogs are welcome. The Scourfields also let cottages and rooms next door, which is convenient, because the inn is essentially the village's entire food and drink offer. There is no shop or butcher in the core; the castle site runs a café and gift shop, and that's the roster.
Most of what you'll do here happens around the millpond. A circular walk of about a mile takes you fully around the 23-acre pond, linking the castle, the restored tidal mill, the Carew Cross and a medieval bridge. It's flat, well-surfaced and buggy-friendly, and dogs on short leads are allowed the whole way — even inside the castle. On a still high tide the pond mirrors the castle back at itself. It pulls in wading birds, and on summer evenings it's a good spot to watch bats.
The castle is worth explaining because it changes shape depending on where you stand. From the west it's a Norman stronghold, begun by Gerald de Windsor around 1100 — the manor came as part of the dowry when he married Nest, princess of Deheubarth. From the north it's an Elizabethan mansion, glazed and mullioned. Same building.
Near the entrance stands the Carew Cross, an 11th-century Celtic cross about 13 feet tall, carved with interlace and knotwork and inscribed to Maredudd ab Edwin, a king of Deheubarth who died in 1035. Cadw adopted it as their logo. The tidal mill beside the pond is the only fully restored one in Wales; a mill has stood here since 1541, and the present building drove seven sets of stones until it stopped in the 1930s.
The parish church, St Mary's at Carew Cheriton, is Grade I listed and holds the tomb of Sir Nicholas de Carew, who built much of the castle and died in 1311. Its sanctuary is paved with medieval tiles thought to have come from the castle itself.
Carew sits on the A4075, signposted off the A477, five miles east of Pembroke and fifteen minutes from Tenby; buses 360 and 361 stop here on their way between Pembroke Dock and Tenby. Local legend says a 17th-century tenant once kept a Barbary ape and set it on a visitor. On stormy nights, the story goes, you can still hear it laughing.