Wales Oh Wales

In an attempt to do some proper trekking and try camping we have set off to Wales. The destination: Llangollen, Velvet Mountain, Kate and Will's home's garden. It's not that they wouldn't let us sleep inside but we really wanted to see if we're able to build a tent and more importantly survive a night in it.

We got to Llangollen just after the midday on Friday (9th July) briefly stopped in the city centre (which was very lively and busy as the Musical Festival Eisteddfod was on since the beginning of the week) and then drove to the Llantysilio where Kate and Will live in a cosy cottage with a magnificent view over the hills and meadows. After refreshing lunch, building a tent (carefully following the instructions from the inside of the tent bag), observing the various birds on the bird feeder and petting Kate's and Will's cat Blackberry we set off for the first trek.

Now, the Welsh names are like jaw-crackers so I don't remember any so this is going to be fun describing :-). We have climbed one of the closest hills, I believe it was one of the Llantysilio hills (which would kind of make sense...) and followed the path towards the old tramway route (I believe it was called Oearnant, please someone correct me if this is not the case...). Trying to get to the top of the mountain led us through some tough and very very off-road paths; at one point we were fighting with bushes of some kind of fern that led us to one of those fences over which you cannot exactly get without some damage to your clothing or your skin. After some more fighting we got back to a proper path though and accompanied by many sheep we trekked over the Llantysilio hills.

The route led us back towards where we started, namely to Britannia Inn on the Horseshoe Pass View road, where we rested briefly with a pint of Guinness and a lovely view over the valley in front of us. We were walking for about three hours on day one during which we learnt how to read a map (a little bit), that there are vast blueberry fields in the hills, that the trekking trousers Paul finally bought on Tuesday that week were really cool (I am sure he will praise them in his post immensely) and that we are able to survive a night in the tent. Oh and there were no sheep marching through the garden in the morning (which was a little disappointment) although there was this cow that booed so loudly in the early morning that it almost felt like she was actually standing next to the tent... you could hear her breathing!

Day two was slightly overcast - at least in the morning. We set off around nine am and took a different direction for our trek. We walked through the meadows and forests of the Eglwyseg, got a bit lost in one of them and again tried what it is like walking in a very uneven and varied terrain, and then joined the famous Offa's Dyke trail that led us through Panorama Walk back towards Llangollen. On the way there we encountered intriguing creatures, something looking a bit like sheep but also looking a bit like cows:

Before ascending to Llangollen for a lunch we also climbed a very steep hill to the ruins of the Dinas Bran Castle.

The weather has cleared a lot since the morning and the sun and lunch made us a bit slow and tired. Still we continued our walk and followed the path along the canal, from Llangollen towards the Horseshoe Falls. The canal is known for its horse-drawn boat rides (unfortunately, I don't have a picture of the horse actually drawing the boat so this is how it looks around the canal):

After reaching the Horseshoe falls I have noticed a persistent pain around and above my left ankle which wouldn't go away and was most likely caused during our tackling the uneven terrain of the forest near Eglwyseg. That meant we started to look for a shortcut back to Will's and walked through some fields and meadows to avoid rather boring road walking. Funnily enough we ended up in Britannia again which was quite handy as we had a chance to refresh ourselves , we just avoided a heavy rain downpour and after we finally made it back to Will's we looked great and not a bit tired! :-) The second night in the tent was as good as the first one, this time we had a chance to experience a little bit of rain and some strong wind, fortunately the tent didn't fly away. Still makes me think about what it's going to be like on the slopes of Kili without the comfort of a cosy cottage nearby or even a comfortable grassy ground under the tent...

Big thanks to Kate and Will for letting us camp in their garden and for feeding us through the weekend! The burgers from the barbeque were excellent!!!

So this was Llangollen, fairly tale place where biking and running is not for the faint-hearted but which offers wonderful views, great trekking adventures and many sheep and cows' encounters. Hoping to be back there soon again...