The Radnor Forest

Sunday 28th August 2022

On my last day while staying in Kington I decided I would turn my attention briefly away from the Offa’s Dyke Path that I had been following on this holiday and my eye had turned west towards the hills of the old county of Radnorshire. The highest point lies within the Radnor Forest, which is an area of upland moorland rising to more than two thousand feet (a forest in this case, and often in England and Wales, denotes an ancient hunting ground). This was not far from where I was staying so I drove from Kington to the small village of New Radnor and parked near the monument. Setting off through the village I took a lane that climbed between a gorgeous line of trees until the gradient eased and I took a path that materialised on my left climbing steeply through fabulous woodland. Navigation was a little tricky as I crossed several forestry tracks, but by keeping a steady progress uphill I eventually found my way to the northern tip of the wood. Near the end I passed through an area that had been felled and provided wild flowers with the opportunity to dominate and gave me a colourful avenue to walk through. After that great start to the walk I emerged onto the moorland where I had hazy views south across the valley and as I continued to climb the views became more extensive, but just as hazy.

Eventually the path eased as I passed through the shallow col on the summit ridge of Bache Hill whose summit, which sports a trig point, lay to my right. I stayed on the track passing over the top and down to a col between Ystol Bach Brook and Cascob Brook whose northern slopes are covered in conifers. I ignored the plantation and took to a track that climbs up to the summit of Black Mixen, which is adorned with a trig point and unfortunately a large radio transmitter. I wisely avoided the transmitter, but made my way to the trig point. The top of this hill is so broad that there were no views possible aside from the heather moorland itself, which at least was in flower. Continuing along the path I came to the edge of Mynydd Ffoesidoes Nature Reserve where I could see an interpretation board inside, but no paths or any way into the reserve. It wasn’t too difficult to climb over the fence and making way through the dense heather I came to the board and read what it had to say. Returning to my path I followed it beside the edge of the conifer plantation and around the top of Harley Dingle with views down into the valley which houses a firing range.

On reaching a bridle path I moved away from the conifers, but soon branched off to head south to the trig point that sits in the middle of the broad top of Great Rhos, which is the highest point in Radnorshire at 660 metres above sea level. In my youth I had the idea that I would attempt to bag all the hills in Wales more than two thousand feet high. I didn’t complete the list, but myself of twenty years ago would have been very happy to have reached the top of Great Rhos as another peak was crossed off the list. There may be other peaks in Wales that I have still not done, but myself of now doesn’t care and it is immaterial that I had just reached the top of Great Rhos. I was just after a good walk. The views to the north and west were a little clearer than they had been south, and I was able to enjoy those views as I made my way across the top of Great Rhos and down the western slopes while the sunshine that I had enjoyed on Black Mixen became smothered in cloud. Soon, I reached a fence that barred my progress and warned of a live firing range ahead, so despite the path crossing the fence and my map indicating that it was safe to do so, I turned right keeping to the side of the fence.

At a fence junction I turned left heading south until I found a clear path that provided me with easier walking while ahead of me the views continued to improve and enabled me to see the Brecon Beacons in the distance. On reaching a bridleway I took that down into Davy Morgan’s Dingle, a narrow valley that was fun to cross, and the delights continued as I passed through an old quarry and along the side of Radnor Range where signs warned of danger. Finally I crossed the stream that comes out of Harley Dingle and around the side of a hill back into the village of New Radnor. This was quite a short walk and I was back at my car by lunch time, which left me with the whole afternoon and nothing to do. When I planned this walk I hadn’t realised it would only last me four hours, but it was an interesting walk up through woodland, across high moorland and down into the spectacular Harley Dingle valley. To fill my afternoon, I decided I would do an unplanned walk somewhere in the neighbourhood and discovered a car park not far away in the valley of Black Brook, so I headed there and parked at the end of a track where notices gave directions to a waterfall that is the main attraction of the area.

However, I wanted to listen to the Belgian Grand Prix on the radio and for that I needed a good DAB signal so I moved quickly away from the waymarked paths onto a track that climbed up a hill and into the grassy fields and broad top of Mynd. I now had a good signal on my radio, but I had no idea where I was. The Radnor Forest was right on the edge of my map and I had just moved off it, so I wandered around aimlessly until I realised I needed to go back down the hill and join a byway that headed north through Cwm Du. Quickly, I made my way back down the hill and, with patchy reception on my radio, along the track until I entered open moorland where I was able to turn off the byway and climb up to the top of Nyth-grug where I was rewarded with a clear radio signal and good views. At the trig point I surveyed my surroundings that included the Radnor Forest where I had walked earlier in the day. To keep high for as long as possible, or at least until the Grand Prix ended, I slowly headed north along the broad grassy ridge veering right to avoid steep ground until I reached a ford across the Mithil Brook at the head of Llan-Evan Dingle. This stream was dry but descended through a stunning rock-filled gorge and I couldn’t resist scrambling through the ravine that felt like an old quarry, but only because it was dry.

This was tremendous fun, but as water started to appear I eventually had to turn around and climb back up through the awesome surroundings to the ford where I took a path that heads towards the Black Brook valley, but this was very sketchy and I kept going the wrong way so I had to battle through thick bracken to reach the correct path. This took me into a conifer plantation where I went wrong again until finally I found the right path into the valley and to the Water-break-its-neck waterfall. This was a magical place filled with vegetation but no water, which enabled me to walk up the rocky ravine until I reached a delectable bowl where a trickle of water was running down the mossy rock face. However, pictures of Water-break-its-neck reveal that this was not the famed waterfall, which was probably downstream and so didn’t have any water. Nevertheless it was worth the effort if only for the walk through the gorge. This second walk required a lot of effort and I gained very little from it, mainly because it was unplanned, but at least I was able to have a walk while listening to the Grand Prix and it was enjoyable enough in that regard. What more could you ask?

Offa’s Dyke Path: Shropshire Hills

Saturday 27th August 2022

After my disappointment with the latter stage of my walk the day before along the Offa’s Dyke Path, I decided to change my plans for this day, which had been very ambitious with a walk of more than twenty miles. Looking at the route, I was afraid it might be through farmer’s fields the whole way, whose monoculture I find to be rather tedious unless the terrain is steep enough to excite me. The Harvey Map for the Offa’s Dyke Path has different colour coding for improved pasture, rough pasture and moorland, and this indicated that beyond the village of Newcastle the land was all farmers’ fields, but there seemed to be more appeal to the section immediately out of Knighton, a market town on the English border that I had reached on the trail the previous day. My change of plan involved catching a bus from Kington, where I was staying, but since this was not due until 10.10, so I had time for a short wander around the area, following the route of the Herefordshire Trail to the River Arrow and then back west, past the campsite and onto the Kingswood Road where the bus stop in the centre of Kington was a short distance away. Once in Knighton I made my way to the Offa’s Dyke Centre where I was able to see some information about the dyke and learn about the efforts being made to preserve the ancient earthwork.

Leaving the Offa’s Dyke Centre, I dropped down through parkland to the lovely valley of the River Teme and crossed into England and the Shropshire Hills, which are really just a continuation of the hills in the Welsh Marches. I was keen to do some walking in the Shropshire Hills so I was glad that I had elected to continue walking along the Offa’s Dyke Path into the Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, at least for a while. After crossing the railway line and a campsite that at one time I had considered staying in, I started to climb steeply up the hill, which made me very hot as the sun chose that very moment to come out, though most of the morning it would remain overcast. When I mercifully reached the top, I walked through delightful scenery that looked over the Teme Valley and follows the Welsh border, though under overcast skies. The path I was following kept to the edge of the escarpment below Panpunton Hill and soon I was accompanied by the actual Offa’s Dyke as we headed north. After a brief period away from the escarpment, I came back to the edge around the dramatic gouge into the side of the hill that is Cwm Sanaham. Fortunately I didn’t have to descend by much before starting to climb up the other side to the trig point that sits at the top of Cwm-sanaham Hill.

On the descent I lost the path by keeping beside the fence so I had to retrace my steps back to the path, only to lose it again almost immediately afterwards as I followed a thin, sketchy path onto steep ground. Turning around I crossed the steep ground onto the correct, annoyingly clear path that took me down to a house, labelled on my Ordnance Survey map as Brynorgan. After crossing a road I climbed over a short ridge that was very tiring, even though it was small, so when I emerged into the field beyond I decided to stop and have my lunch while sitting on Offa’s Dyke and enjoying the sunshine. On the other side of the field I crossed a delectable wood-covered stream with hardly any water in it and soon crossed another, similar stream that had only slightly more water. It was distressing to see the efforts that sheep were making on this walk to avoid the hot sunshine, finding as much shade as they could even when this was sketchy at best. After passing Garbett Hall I joined a farmer’s track that steadily climbs the hill, which was a painful and exhausting climb in the hot weather. The track follows Offa’s Dyke but keeps away from it, running alongside, and several times crossed the dyke until eventually the gradient eased and I reached the trig point on Llanfair Hill where I decided I had had enough.

The view ahead seemed to be tedious as the trail crosses the broad top of Llanfair Hill, so I turned around and headed back along the Offa’s Dyke Path to Knighton. After many days of long, tiring walks I thought I needed a much shorter walk, so after just 4.7 miles on the trail I was heading back down the hill, but immediately I came off the trail and onto the dyke. The trail used to run along the top of the dyke, but to preserve the ancient earthwork it was moved off and onto the farmer’s track. However, there is still a right-of-way on the dyke so I followed that for the descent and enjoyed the airy feeling of walking along the top of the dyke with the tremendous scenery of the Welsh Marches to my right until eventually I returned to the Offa’s Dyke Path and completed the descent back to Garbett Hall. Normally you wouldn’t want to cover the same ground twice, but on this occasion it allowed me to see where I had gone wrong on the descent from Cwm-sanaham Hill, missing a totally blatant signpost, and also gave me an opportunity to enjoy the fabulous escarpment edge again and now in sunnier weather. It was quite hot on this walk, which didn’t help on the occasions when I was climbing and resulted in me sweating profusely on many occasions, but it was still very enjoyable.

I have not done much walking in the Shropshire Hills before and I wasn’t sure what to make of them after this walk. I like steep terrain and rock, so while, in places, there are steep gradients, unfortunately the Shropshire Hills are lacking in rock. Most of the hills are covered by farmer’s fields and their gradients are a little too gentle, but I did enjoy this short walk. I could have taken a complete rest on this day and not done any walking, but that is not in my nature, so instead I did a short walk of less than ten miles. The views may not have been overly dramatic, but they were lovely in their gentleness and perhaps that is what I needed.