The Black Mountains Memorial Walk

Saturday 5th September 2009

Not to be confused with the Black Mountain which I’d walked over the day before this walk, this was the area where I made my first mountain walk. In fact it was almost exactly 10 years ago since my first walk in the Black Mountains that was the start of all this fun, so it was with the feeling of doing a sort of memorial walk that I parked at the top of the gospel pass where I have started many a walk in the past, and began my latest venture into the Black Mountains. My first target was Twmpa, a grassy topped hill with a steep northern face that overlooks the vast Wye Valley. The weather for this walk was less agreeable than it had been the day before being dull and overcast with a strong, cold wind blowing in from the north.

While battling these winds I followed the edge of the escarpment past the summit of Twmpa, down to the top of a valley and up to the top of the vast broad hill of Rhos Dirion. At the summit trig point I turned south-east and followed the top of the long, muddy ridge as it slowly descends and narrows towards Chwarel y Fan. Eventually I reached a cairn marked on maps as the Blacksmith’s Anvil, but I have no idea whether the messy pile of stones I’d reached was the actual blacksmith’s anvil or whether it even still exists. What I had found didn’t deserve such a grand title. The first time I visited the Blacksmith’s Anvil was on my second visit to the Black Mountains at Easter 2000 when I remember slipping all the way down the hill in my cheap boots. There were no such difficulties on this occasion as I turned left and descended steeply down a rocky path into the Vale of Ewyas and the picturesque hamlet of Capel-y-Ffin.

Now began the climb that was most memorable ten years ago when I climbed the steep hillside above Capel-y-FFin in hot weather. This time the weather was much cooler and hopefully I am fitter than I was ten years ago. Since that first occasion I have done this climb many times, and in both directions, and I have never failed to be thrilled by its stunning views of the sweeping curves of the valley. This was a fitting memorial to that first walk, but did I have to copy it so closely at this point? On that occasion I made a mistake and lost the path while still near the bottom of the valley, and now I did exactly the same thing coming across the river, Afon Honddu. Shamefully I crawled back up the hill and rejoined the path which hadn’t descended to the river and continued on my way thinking that I needed to do this path more often! It is almost five years since I was last on it and it was showing. When I reached the Offa’s Dyke Path at the top of the ridge I hunkered down on the ground and had my lunch. After eating I continued over the ridge dropping down again, into the Olchon Valley. I'd visited this valley only once before and I was keen to repeat my earlier walk along the narrowest and probably the best ridge in the Black Mountains. After successfully crossing the farmland at the bottom of the Olchon Valley I began the steep climb up to the top of Black Hill, and the fabulously narrow ridge of Crib y Garth. This ridge is narrow by the standards of anywhere and is a great walk along the often rocky top of the ridge before it finally widens beyond the summit and becomes standard heather-clad moorland once more. My walk continued through gorgeous in-bloom heather-clad moorland back to the Offa’s Dyke Path and across to Hay Bluff and the stunning views of the Wye Valley once again.

Twmpa and Hay Bluff were my first mountains but they were not the highest point of that walk ten years ago. That was actually on the ridge that the Offa’s Dyke Path passes over which surpasses 700 metres. From Hay Bluff a short walk led me down the easy slope while battling winds back to my car. This was a fabulous memorial walk and made me think that it would be a good idea to return in five years time for another memorial in this area that means so much to me. Even though Twmpa and Hay Bluff were my first mountains I don't think they are essential for a memorial walk, nor even an exact replica of that first walk, which this certainly wasn't as it was considerably longer! All that is really required for a memorial walk in the Black Mountains is that climb from Capel-y-Ffin as that was the defining moment of the walk and always screams to be repeated. That climb was a defining moment in my life where I started mountain walking and has to be memorialised. I will be definitely making a date five years from now, wherever I am, to come back to the Black Mountains and do a memorial walk over these fabulous hills once again.