Foel Fawr.

Still sunny today with more in the way of clouds and less of the icy wind. In other words an excellent day for going out for an afternoon's walk with friends.

Five of us met at Furnace for a walk up Foel Fawr (big baldy) the hill that rises up from the main road. After crossing the road and stopping to admire the water rushing over the dam built in 1755 to power the furnace waterwheel we scrambled up the wooded slope .....

.... to the old toll road with it's wonderful moss covered stone walls.

We stayed on the road as it zig-zagged up the hill cutting off some of the bends by following narrow paths that went straight up through the bracken and brambles.

Eventually we turned off the road onto the path that runs along the side of the hill giving great views out to sea.

We stopped at the official viewpoint and perched on the rocks to eat our lunch. A robin was hanging around hopefully so I crumbled up a couple of oat biscuits for it to eat once we had gone.

As we continued along the side of the hill the darkening skies inland made the perfect backdrop for the spotlight effect of the sun on the bare trees and the golden bracken.

We came to the lone tree in the sheltered dell favoured by the ponies that live out on the hill and sure enough above us were three white ponies. It's not often that we see the ponies so that was a treat for me.

More views across the Dyfi as we made our way down the hill across some very wet sections of path before picking up the old toll road at the bottom of the hill. We then followed the toll road back to Furnace, crossed the main road and were back at the car park before dark.