Author Archive: Andrew Green

rss feed

Snowdonia Slate Trail, day 2: Llanberis to Y Fron

September 12, 2025 0 Comments
Snowdonia Slate Trail, day 2: Llanberis to Y Fron

Today’s a rare day: no waterproofs needed, and sun forecast for the afternoon.  We set off from Llanberis and climb up the lane towards Waunfawr.  On average, each day of the Trail crosses two watersheds, and this is the first of today’s two ascents.  Sheep outnumber people by some margin, as usual.  Their fleeces are […]

Continue Reading »

Snowdonia Slate Trail, day 1: Bethesda to Llanberis

September 5, 2025 0 Comments
Snowdonia Slate Trail, day 1: Bethesda to Llanberis

I’ve had my eye on Llwybr Llechi Eryri, the Snowdonia Slate Trail, ever since it opened in 2017, and especially since two seasoned long-distance walkers, Eirlys Thomas and Lucy O’Donnell, told me in 2021 that it was one of the best long treks they’d ever tried.  So the three of us, C1, C2 and I, […]

Continue Reading »

The artist from behind

August 29, 2025 1 Comment
The artist from behind

What’s happening when artists choose to portray themselves in their work?  The self-portrait was an invention of the Renaissance, but it’s just as common today, in painting (Jenny Saville’s work, now on show in a big retrospective at the National Portrait Gallery, is a striking example) and in many other forms.  Perhaps the most famous […]

Continue Reading »

On the buses

August 22, 2025 7 Comments
On the buses

A couple of weeks ago Transport for Wales invited people to come along to Swansea Bus Station to give their views on the routes that buses in the city should take, once TfW takes over full responsibility for decisions from the existing bus companies.  We went along and had some interesting chats with TfW staff […]

Continue Reading »

George Bowring: murdered by Welsh magic

August 15, 2025 3 Comments
George Bowring: murdered by Welsh magic

The Victorian writer R.D. Blackmore, if he’s remembered at all today, is known for his three-volume novel Lorna Doone.  It’s an adventure story, set on Exmoor in the seventeenth century, about the feuding and violent Doone clan and the love between the narrator, John Ridd, and the eponymous Lorna.  The book sold badly on its […]

Continue Reading »

Bye bye, Brinley

August 8, 2025 7 Comments
Bye bye, Brinley

Doedd y newyddion am farwolaeth Brinley ar 3 Awst ddim yn syndod – roedd yn 96 mlwydd oedd ac yn fregus yn dilyn strôc – ond daeth ton o dristwch mawr drosto i, o feddwl yn ôl dros y blynyddoedd o’n cyfeillgarwch. Aeth fy meddwl yn ôl yn syth i’r diwrnod cyntaf welais Brinley, yn […]

Continue Reading »

Dawn dweud

August 1, 2025 0 Comments
Dawn dweud

Bu tipyn o sôn yn y wasg yn ddiweddar am sgiliau ‘dawn dweud’ neu ‘medrau llafar’, neu ‘oracy’, i ddefnyddio’r gair Saesneg anhardd – y gallu i fynegi eich hun mewn ffordd rugl a gramadegol, ac i wrando ar yr hyn mae pob eraill yn ei ddweud wrthych chi. Yn 2024 cyhoeddodd comisiwn annibynnol ar […]

Continue Reading »

The Tower of the Nets

July 25, 2025 4 Comments
The Tower of the Nets

How many Swansea people, when they stroll along the sea wall past the Observatory (the Tower of the Ecliptic) in the Maritime Quarter stop to look closely at the diminutive building that sits on its own on the other side of the path?  (I say ‘Observatory’, but that building ceased to be the home of […]

Continue Reading »

Deep in Carmarthenshire

July 18, 2025 6 Comments
Deep in Carmarthenshire

If you’re in love with green – I mean chlorophyll-saturated green, the lightest and deepest greens that nature can offer – there are fewer better places to find it than north-west Carmarthenshire.  To wander through the fields and woods on the hills either side of the Tywi valley and its tributaries is to soak your […]

Continue Reading »

Tigers and dragons

July 11, 2025 5 Comments
Tigers and dragons

What connects the histories and cultures of India and Wales?  As it turns out, a complex nexus of links that have intertwined for centuries and continue to do so today.   This is the theme of Tigers and dragons, a truly ambitious exhibition in the Glynn Vivian Art Gallery.  It’s a great visual feast for the […]

Continue Reading »