A DIP into life in Wales in 2013 might convince you that it was mostly a good year. But like all good things 2014 may see that come to an end. One thing’s for sure — there are challenges ahead.

Take the weather. In July we holidayed in Aberdyfi and visited Aberystwyth, where we walked the length of its promenade along the volcanic beach. It was a benign sea, a sublimely beautiful warm day of a golden Welsh summer that attracted thousands more tourists than usual.

They marvelled at the Victorian grandeur of the attractively paved and fenced seafront.

What a contrast to the first weekend of 2014. On television we saw the same seafront being smashed to smithereens by raging seas with 40-foot waves.

The promenade’s railings and paving were ripped up and the lives of those silly enough to get too close were endangered.

The residents of the Victorian terraces were evacuated and the need for millions more in spending to reconstruct stares a community bracing itself for a Westminster-imposed austerity budget in the face.

Thus it was that Aberystwyth’s troubles led the news bulletins and front pages, an unusual event. Sky News was in unknown territory.

It placed the town in south Wales, highlighting the fact that Wales’s news media is mostly based in England. Distant and ignorant, it creates a democratic deficit which hampers the Welsh public’s ability to make informed judgements.

This isn’t helped by Welsh politicians who have opportunities to make devolution more relevant but lack the dynamism to do so.

This year a Bill is in hand which would give the Welsh Assembly government powers to increase its funding directly from stamp duties and landfill sites and to borrow big sums for infrastructure projects.

The power to raise cash through a limited income tax is also on offer, but only, British Prime Minister David Cameron has ruled, if approved in a referendum.

The income tax plan was immediately opposed by Welsh First Minister and Labour leader Carwyn Jones, who says the referendum is likely to be lost.

Jones also says there needs to be change in the Barnett formula which determines what share Wales gets out of Britain’s annual spending budget.

He argues, with others, that we are being short-changed.

But will we get reform of the formula? Fat chance.

To win new income tax powers through a referendum would not be easy.

Jones would need to take lessons in leadership style from Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond to start setting the agenda.

More importantly it would need cross-party support including from the opposition.

There seems no great stomach for a fight on either side of the assembly.

All concerned need convincing that the prize would be significant, the referendum a chance to raise political issues and to loosen the monetary chains emanating from Westminster.

Sport in 2013 was a triumph for Wales.

The Welsh national anthem Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau (land of my fathers) featured, perhaps not officially, across the world in football where Cardiff became a Premier League side and Swansea won the League Cup and in rugby.

Wales carried off the Six Nations trophy, dismantling England to clinch it, and in Australia the anthem rang out in honour of a Lions side stuffed with Welshmen. Leigh Halfpenny was player of the series.

But Hen Wlad Fy Nadhau is less in evidence now as the regional system that launched five clubs — now four — eight years ago to try to match Europe’s greatest is in danger of collapse.

Clubs are locked in combat with the Wales Rugby Union (WRU) over money and where they play to get it.

The system has never fulfilled its aims, as it tried to replace local tribal loyalties to Valley towns and cities with support of “regions.”

Swansea and Neath did OK as the Ospreys. Not so the (Cardiff) Blues, the (Newport) Dragons or the (Llanelli) Sacrlets, great Welsh rugby centres kept afloat by WRU money. Second-tier clubs which once commanded thousands of fans are being undermined by a lack of support.

What the solution is to the plight of the regions is anybody’s guess. I suspect the WRU may well be involved however as it holds the purse strings.

The miracle is that the Wales international team is full of great players, honed by New Zealand coach Warren Gatland.

But his staff is being undermined as players move daily to securer futures and securer futures, forming queues at the borders reminiscent of new EU member states.

Whatever! Happy new year.