Tag: walking

Mr Bebb’s dislike of the motor car

June 3, 2022 3 Comments
Mr Bebb’s dislike of the motor car

Not many people these days have heard of Ambrose Bebb.  Maybe some Welsh speakers, especially following Robin Chapman’s 1997 biography, but very few others.  His son Dewi Bebb, the rugby player, and his grandson Guto Bebb, the former MP, are probably much better known.  In the interwar period, though, Ambrose Bebb was known for his […]

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Wye Valley Walk, day 13: Llangurig to Rhyd-y-Benwch

May 13, 2022 3 Comments
Wye Valley Walk, day 13: Llangurig to Rhyd-y-Benwch

We’re back to four of us today.  We’ve arranged to meet Ch on the Wye bridge: he’s been staying in Clochfaen, a large house completed in 1915 by the Verney family, who invested large amounts of money into the economy and buildings of Llangurig in the late nineteenth century.  Earlier the village even had a […]

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Wye Valley Walk, day 12: Rhayader to Llangurig

May 13, 2022 0 Comments
Wye Valley Walk, day 12: Rhayader to Llangurig

We gather at the town clock.  It looks at first sight as if it’s one of the family of Victorian town clocks at the centre of many mid-Wales towns, but the Rhayader example dates from 1924 and acts as a memorial to the dead of the First World War.  On each face are stone relief […]

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Wye Valley Walk, day 11: Newbridge-on-Wye to Rhayader

May 13, 2022 0 Comments
Wye Valley Walk, day 11: Newbridge-on-Wye to Rhayader

Sun and warmth have returned.  We’re taxi’d back from Rhayader to Newbridge for a rather longer walk than yesterday’s.  We wait on the bridge, and immediately spot our first kite of the day.  As well as A we’re joined by a second guest, J.  The four of us start on a minor road below the […]

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Wye Valley Walk, day 10: Builth Wells to Newbridge-on-Wye

May 12, 2022 0 Comments
Wye Valley Walk, day 10: Builth Wells to Newbridge-on-Wye

We’ve been given a short stretch today after yesterday’s labours.  The owner of the guest house waves us off.  We’re too late to see the otters, he says, but we might consider a dip in Plum Tree Pool, a few miles upriver.  Luckily I’ve left my swimming trunks behind. The sky has heavier clouds than […]

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Wye Valley Walk, day 9: Boughrood to Builth Wells

May 11, 2022 0 Comments
Wye Valley Walk, day 9: Boughrood to Builth Wells

At breakfast we resume our conversation with another Two Women.  This time they’re trail riders (I detect a wince when I let slip the term ‘pony trekkers’).   We saw them twice yesterday, next to the river.  They’ve come from Hay, their borrowed horses are spending the night in a nearby field, and in the morning […]

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Wye Valley Walk, day 8: Hay-on-Wye to Boughrood

May 10, 2022 2 Comments
Wye Valley Walk, day 8: Hay-on-Wye to Boughrood

Hay looks unbookish today.  It’s a few weeks before the Literature Festival gets under way.  The bookshops are open, but there aren’t enough visitors in town to make them look busy.  Other shops look closed or hibernating, waiting for the end of May.  But we’re here, C and I, back to start the Wye Valley […]

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Wye Valley Walk, day 7: Monnington-on-Wye to Hay-on-Wye

September 25, 2021 0 Comments
Wye Valley Walk, day 7: Monnington-on-Wye to Hay-on-Wye

Before breakfast we meet the Couple from Chepstow properly for the first time, and have a chance to share our parallel experiences of the Walk.  S. and J., it turns out, live in Tunbridge Wells and are keen ramblers.  They’re not stopping at Hay like us, but plan to go on to Rhayader.  Not for […]

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Wye Valley Walk, day 6: Hereford to Monnington-on-Wye

September 25, 2021 0 Comments
Wye Valley Walk, day 6: Hereford to Monnington-on-Wye

It’s a still, bright Sunday morning.  We walk from our B&B through the quiet streets of Hereford, calling at our favourite lunch provider, Greggs, and make for the Cathedral to visit an attraction we missed yesterday, the statue in the close of Edward Elgar leaning on his bicycle.  As we walk towards to Wye Bridge […]

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Wye Valley Walk, day 5: Fownhope to Hereford

September 25, 2021 0 Comments
Wye Valley Walk, day 5: Fownhope to Hereford

Today our friends at Celtic Trails, who organised our trip, have taken pity on us and given us a half day off: there’s just between six and seven miles of easy walking ahead.  For the first time we’re reduced to three walkers.  We’re taken by taxi from Hereford to Fownhope, and we’ve persuaded the driver […]

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