The meet up place for the group walk was Devil's Bridge high up in the Cambrian hills. I took the route that runs along the ridge on the south side of the Vale of Rheidol in order to enjoy the views on the way. I left early enough that I had the time to stop and take some photos of both the views and some pretty ponies. What might not be so clear from these photos is the fact that between each of the lines of hills are deep valleys with nearly vertical wooded sides. The rounded tops of the hills are often farmed as are the wide and lush valleys.
Today's walk took us through upland fields before dipping down through wooded slopes.
And across streams of course. Wales is nothing if not wet.
From time to time we had clear views along the valley and later we heard and then caught a glimpse of one of the steam trains making its way to Devil's Bridge.
We made a perilous crossing of the barbed wire fence using the collapsed remains of a stile which can just be seen next to the tree in the centre of the photo. Having long legs I bypassed the stile, swung my leg over the top of the fence and nearly came to grief when I got caught on the barbed wire. The barbs had been sort of flattened at that section but I still had to carefully unhook my leggings in order to avoid making a hole in my favourite leggings.
I found out from one of the group who lives in the area that the dead conifers, larch I think, had been deliberately killed by bark ringing. This was done by the Woodland Trust so that they can be replaced with native deciduous trees. Having found our proposed route to a good viewpoint blocked by a gate that was tied shut and bore a sign saying 'Private' we sat on a ridge that was once a field wall and enjoyed the view from there as we ate our lunch.
Having had mostly sunny weather for our walk once we got home it got much colder and now it's raining quite heavily.
No comments:
Post a Comment