A businessman who moved his family to Wales in the hope of building a dream lifestyle says he has been forced to return to England. Peter Dive snapped up 20 acres of land and a cluster of derelict buildings and moved with his family from Suffolk to the stunning Eryri (Snowdonia) national park in February 2023. Among his purchases was the historic Rhiw Goch Inn, which he bought for £200,000 at auction, with the vision of transforming it into a bustling pub and restaurant.
He would live in an adjacent bungalow with his family and develop luxury cabins and glamping pods. He also had ambitions to revive tobogganing and skiing on the site's slopes and turn it into a prime spot for weddings and events. However, Mr Dive quickly discovered that owning a listed building in a national park was a recipe for a planning disaster, branding it his "worst investment".
Speaking to WalesOnline a year later , he revealed that he has all but abandoned his plans and returned to Suffolk with his children, leaving the fire-damaged properties largely untouched due to stalled planning permissions. The problems began in spring 2023 when the Eryri National Park Authority halted renovations on the bungalow Mr Dive intended as a home for his family, where they could settle and have his children enrolled in the local school by September. Mr Dive revealed how he was plunged into a planning nightmare when the national park authority informed him he needed additional permissions to work on his bungalow beca.