travel
North from Cwmgïedd
Some of the solo days out I remember best are the result of fleeing from some ‘unmissable’ public event. The marriage of Charles Windsor and Diana Spencer on 29 July 1981 was the excuse for a blissful day-long bike ride, from Hereford to Cardiff via the Wye valley, when the lanes were emptied of cars […]
Offa’s Dyke Path, day 7: Hay-on-Wye to Kington
Yet another sunny, warm day. This will be a three-water-bottle day, since it’s fifteen miles to Kington and there won’t be anywhere to eat or buy food en route. C and I pick up supplies from a shop and cross the Wye. Instead of carrying on along the road to Clyro, the Path turns immediately […]
Offa’s Dyke Path, day 6: Longtown to Hay-on-Wye
Another sunny morning. We pick up some sandwiches from Hopes, Longtown’s village shop. This must surely be the best village shop in the UK. It’s like a mini department store, and stocks almost everything you’d ever want; it even has micro-bookshop, and it acts as a post office, with a sorting office in a metal […]
Offa’s Dyke Path, day 5: Llangattock Lingoed to Longtown
Another morning of complete stillness and no clouds (just a criss-cross of high vapour-trails). Today Ca and Ch leave us, and C and I leave the rolling lowlands behind and head for the bare heights of the Black Mountains. First, there’s a bit more of the green country we’ve come to love in Monmouthshire. On […]
Offa’s Dyke Path, day 3: Bigsweir to Hendre
The morning’s chilly and overcast, and at first a low mist flows downstream, blocking the view of Llandogo. We march briskly along the riverside drive to Bigsweir Bridge, where G and A are waiting for us. The iron bridge makes an elegant low curve across the water, with metal latticework beneath and a tollhouse on […]
Offa’s Dyke Path, day 2: Chepstow to Bigsweir
After breakfast we wait for three more guestwalkers, J, G and A. It’s unusual to have as many as six in the group, and there can be drawbacks – losing members by accident on the way, for example – but it makes for a rich mix of character and conversation. We cross the old iron […]
Offa’s Dyke Path, day 1: Sedbury Cliffs to Chepstow
A couple of ancient carriages, probably scheduled to be replaced by Transport for Wales in the year 2030, rattle their way into Chepstow Station. One of the few adverts inside is for a useful sounding firm called Simple Cremations. As we get out it’s raining hard, and C and I dive into the station café […]
Steel mountain
For an early May walk the three of us are back here in Port Talbot, a town much in the news lately. First things first: coffee and serious cakes in a popular café, Selections, as fuel for a steep ascent. As always in Port Talbot, smiles and friendliness greet us. Then we wander across the […]
Walking with windmills
The Heart of Wales line train leaves me at the station in Ammanford. It’s still, sunny, and warm, the second day of summer time, with an extra hour of daylight walking. My plan is to cross Mynydd y Betws and Mynydd y Gwair and drop down the Lliw valley to Gowerton, completing the Gower Way. […]
Up the Ely river
Where we start happens to be in south Cardiff, but could be anywhere in the world in 2019. Apartments are stacked in Duplo’d piles, each block with a ‘concierge’ and a primary colour. Sheds, with metal roofs shaped in shallow arcs, are home to companies that shelter behind opaque titles, usually including the word ‘global’. […]
