Bear Grylls bought a 20-acre island and houseboat for under $300,000, cheaper than a London apartment, but with no electricity or running water

In 2001, television adventurer Bear Grylls along with his wife Shara Grylls were looking to purchase a property in London. Known for surviving in some of the world's harshest environments, his most unusual adventure happened when he purchased a 20-acre private island in Wales along with a houseboat for less than $300,000. The prices of houses in London astonished them. But here's the most interesting part: the property did not have basic modern amenities, including electricity and running water.

“In 2001 we were going to buy a London flat for $288,000, but we bought a houseboat on the Thames [now sold] and the island together and it cost less than the apartment, so we decided on the path less trodden and an amazing adventure,” Grylls explained to The Sunday Times in 2021.

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All about Bear Grylls' 20-acre private island

The 20-acre private island of Bear Grylls St Tudwal's Island West, , lies off the Llŷn Peninsula near Abersoch. Reports suggest that he bought island for around £95,000 after negotiating with its owners and the houseboat cost approximately £100,000. Together, the purchases came to less than $300,000, making them cheaper than a London flat at the time.

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The island offered privacy and stunning coastal scenery and also featured 200-year-old lighthouse and two old lighthouse keepers' cottages. However, the buildings were in poor condition, with damaged or missing roofs, no electricity or running water, and a rat problem.

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“The island had a 200-year-old lighthouse and two lightkeeper’s cottages, but [the houses] were derelict with no power, no water, no roof and rats,” he told the outlet. “I remember my first bath sitting in three inches of water pumped from the old tanks we’d cleaned out. There was rubble everywhere and rain coming through, but it was a great moment.”

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How Bear Grylls transformed the rundown cottages

Bear Gryll spent years to turn the neglected and delipidated into a livable retreat. Eventually, the two cottages were combined to create a four-bedroom home, with thick limestone walls helping regulate indoor temperatures through changing seasons. In 2012, he told Vanity Fair, “It’s as tough as you get, with two-foot-thick old limestone walls that make it cool in summer and warm in winter. But when those gales come in, you can still feel it almost shake, and sea spray reaches the windows despite the 150-foot elevation.”

Because of those conditions, it isn’t necessarily a place where the family entertains. “We keep it very private and generally it’s just Shara and our three children.”

He explained, “We do sometimes have friends to stay, but only one family at a time, and they need to be up for an adventure and prepared to get stuck there if the weather turns.”

Explaining how he arranged supplies from the mainland, he said, “It took about ten years to gain permission to build a slipway on the island, which we finished about three years ago. It has been life-changing for us. Previously we had to keep a boat on a mooring, row ashore and walk a mile up the beach with all the shopping."

“We have wild, wild seas and when it got rough you wouldn’t sleep thinking about what would happen to the boat. We also have an old RNLI D-class lifeboat. The boys have grown up very competent and respectful around the sea. We have a quad bike and trailer to get supplies up to the house.”

Grylls invested in renewable energy sources for the island early on, telling The Telegraph in 2008, “Part of each year my young family and me live on a small remote Welsh island. It is a few miles offshore with no mains electricity or running water. We power the island with a small wind turbine and we collect rain water off the roof. It works”