Over the next few years, Pennant made various excursions in North Wales. As with his other tours, he started from Downing. Almost one hundred pages in the first volume that he subsequently wrote were about the ancient city of Chester. His emphasis in these books was on history and the antiquities he saw, rather than on natural history. He was interested in Owain Glyndŵr and his struggle with Henry IV for supremacy in Wales. The first volume of Tour in Wales was published in 1778 but covered a limited area of the country. In an attempt to remedy this, it was followed by a Journey to Snowdon (part one in 1781 and part two in 1783), and these later jointly became the second volume of his Tour. Although these also concentrated on the history of the places visited, they provided some information on the zoology and botany, in the later case with the assistance of Reverend Lightfoot. Pennant includes tales of the strongwoman and harpist Marged ferch Ifan although he never met her. Pennant mentions tales of the beaver's presence on the River Conwy with a deep stretch being known as Llyn yr afangc (Beaver's pool). He also records herons nesting at the top of the cliffs at St Orme's Head above the noisy gulls, razorbills, guillemots and cormorants which had their own nesting zones further down.