Tag: walking

St Illtud’s Walk, day 5: Pontardawe to Creunant

November 10, 2023 2 Comments
St Illtud’s Walk, day 5: Pontardawe to Creunant

Forestry isn’t my favourite walking environment, and today has done nothing to shift that prejudice.  It all began so well.  Well, fairly well.  Today C. and I start out by bus.  But since our last encounter with St Illtud, First Cymru has done its best to destroy our local bus timetable.  It now takes nearly […]

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St Illtud’s Walk, day 4: Penlle’r Castell to Pontardawe

September 22, 2023 0 Comments
St Illtud’s Walk, day 4: Penlle’r Castell to Pontardawe

No buses go anywhere near Penlle’r Castell, so C and I are lucky this morning to catch a lift by car.  It’s a bright autumn day, with good visibility and little threat of rain.  We’re back on the high moor in the middle of windmill land, and the path takes us through another turbine colony, […]

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Wandering in Meirionnydd

September 16, 2023 1 Comment
Wandering in Meirionnydd

In 1939, just before the outbreak of war, a woman called Hope Hewett published a book about her journeys alone on foot around Merioneth.  She has a genial and charming authorial voice, recounting her travels in the company of Jack, her faithful terrier, as they criss-cross their way across the county.  Today Hope and her […]

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Glyndŵr’s Way, day 6: Dylife to Machynlleth

June 17, 2023 5 Comments
Glyndŵr’s Way, day 6: Dylife to Machynlleth

The three of us are delivered back by car from Pennant to Y Star in Dylife – coming this way you can appreciate the scale of the lead waste tips – and we wait for M-A and her family to arrive from Trefenter.  Our host tells us that the worst part of this final day […]

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Glyndŵr’s Way, day 5: Llanidloes to Dylife

June 17, 2023 1 Comment
Glyndŵr’s Way, day 5: Llanidloes to Dylife

It’s early on Saturday morning.  Friday night has exhausted the inhabitants and the streets of Llanidloes are quiet as the four of us set out across the town.  The Red Lion in Long Bridge Street is clearly a royalist stronghold, parading its union flags and coronation kitsch.  On the other side of the street the […]

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Glyndŵr’s Way, day 4: Abbey Cwmhir to Llanidloes

June 17, 2023 0 Comments
Glyndŵr’s Way, day 4: Abbey Cwmhir to Llanidloes

From Abbey Cwmhir we’ve three days of long walking.  Today, on paper, is the longest, at over fifteen miles.  In addition, the temperature is forecast to be higher; already the sun is shining and we’re down to T-shirts almost from the start.  Our luggage is ready to be transported to our next stop.  Yesterday we […]

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Glyndŵr’s Way, day 3: Llanbadarn Fynydd to Abbey Cwmhir

June 17, 2023 0 Comments
Glyndŵr’s Way, day 3: Llanbadarn Fynydd to Abbey Cwmhir

Over breakfast in The Lion at Llanbister we chat with Mr T, whose farming family go back many generations in the area.  He seems to share many of the conservative views for which Radnorshire people are known.  We hear about many of the things he’s against: electric cars, the Welsh Government, climate change protestors, rewilding […]

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Glyndŵr’s Way, day 2: Short Ditch to Llanbadarn Fynydd

June 17, 2023 0 Comments
Glyndŵr’s Way, day 2: Short Ditch to Llanbadarn Fynydd

Another grey morning, with an easterly wind, but again we’re promised sun and heat later.  Sharon appears at the Red Lion to take us back to Short Ditch, where we left off yesterday, along some narrow and winding lanes.  She tells us she’s Knighton born and bred.  She’s not had a holiday for over ten […]

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Glyndŵr’s Way, day 1: Knighton to Short Ditch

June 16, 2023 0 Comments
Glyndŵr’s Way, day 1: Knighton to Short Ditch

It’s a grey and cool June morning in Knighton as C1, C2 and I set off on six days of walking Glyndŵr’s Way, as far as Machynlleth.  We’ve all done some practice walks, but this promises to be a challenge.  The hills of Radnorshire and Montgomeryshire are frequent and the miles many.   We’re not used […]

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Sarn Helen, end to end

February 10, 2023 4 Comments
Sarn Helen, end to end

Several stretches of Roman road in Wales are labelled ‘Sarn Helen’.  The one Tom Bullough sets out to walk, in a roughly straight line except for a lurch eastward to Brecon Gaer, is the road that leads from the fort at Nidum (Neath) to Canovium (Caerhun, near Conwy).  He has recorded his trip in a […]

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