Wales in Photos
What comes to mind when you think of Wales?
Driving on the left side of the road on narrow roads? If so, that is the case. Driving is on the left and there are tons of roads with two way traffic but only room for one car. Driving is never dull but you do get used to being on the left.
Maybe when you think of Wales you think of the Welsh language with all it's difficult to pronounce words. The signs in Wales are all in Welsh and English and Welsh does have a lot of words with few vowels and lots of consonants. Although only about 20% of people in Wales speak Welsh we heard plenty of it spoken.
Maybe when you think of Wales you think of castles. I think I saw a poster claiming that Wales has 641 castles.
Maybe you think of rural towns that have been around for a very long time. We certainly saw lots of those with buildings that were hundreds of years old.
You may also think of sheep when you hear of Wales. There are certainly lots of sheep in Wales as although farming has struggled to recover from Foot and Mouth disease it is still an important part of the culture and economy.
Maybe when you think of Wales you think of friendly people you might meet. We did meet plenty of friendly Welsh people but this picture is actually of some English blokes. These guys were from Manchester and we were lucky enough to be camped next to them for two nights. They had a roaring fire (a rarity in Wales), some beer and chairs so we imposed on them and they were kind enough to let us hang out with them. They were enjoying Bank Holiday Weekend and were on a mountain bike boys weekend.
Speaking of camping here is a shot of the campsite at Betws y Coed (pronounced bet us e coyd). It was jam packed the Saturday night we stayed there.
Here is one of the many grocery stores we visited on our trip. We only went into Port Talbort 3 times before we finally located the Tesco which is a big grocery store. We had some fun experiences looking for good places to buy a camp stove, towels, food, and other smaller items we didn't take with us.
Here we are enjoying some fine camping. Unlike all the other campers we didn't have a table or chairs but there is nothing like sitting on the ground and cooking up some food.
One campground was super deluxe and had 3 picnic tables and we were able to score one for ourselves so that night we actually didn't have to sit on the ground. We also would from time to time find a picnic area with a picnic table and we would cook there instead of at our campsite. You get creative when you're on the road.
Here's one of our deluxe dinner with pasta in a fancy tomato sauce with a roll and two drinks. Usually we just drank the Beck's that the Manchester blokes left us with but on this particular night we also had lemonade Fanta.
We camped one night at a farm campground outside Machynlleth (pronounced ma khun clyth). There were some people practicing their fire baton twirling which provided some good entertainment.
Our most deluxe campground (the one with picnic tables) had lots of crazy sculptures all over the property as well.
Oh yeah and there was a whole lot of riding to be done as well.
First was Cwm Carn (pronounced Quim Carn). It was an awesome trail and although I didn't ride it there was also a free ride park and a downhill trail. Here I am showing off one of the many styles of gates that there were to ride through.
Okay, so we didn't take a lot of photos of that trail as we were too busy having a blast riding it. So now for some photos from the Afan Forest trails. I think these are my favorite trails in Wales that we rode. There were 3 trails - Penhydd, The Wall and Whites Level. All started with long climbs but the downhill singletrack was so awesome that you didn't even care. I can't wait to go back and ride these trail again!
This section was for crossing a peat bog and it was a fairly long section with some tricky turns and as you can see also some twists. A couple of times I came pretty close to riding off the side.
Next up for us was heading north and riding at Nant Yr Arian. There was several ways to do this ride but Dave and I did the long ride which included lots of riding fire roads but also incorporated all the singletrack sections. You can do the singletrack in two other shorter rides but we were trying to do the most trails in the shortest amount of days.
After that we headed to Machynlleth which is a pretty cool town with an alternative technology center. We never got there since we were busy riding but we did go to the Farmer's Market which was in town the day we were there. The afternoon we got there we headed out to do the ride but after 45 minutes (of mostly climbing) we had exhausted all of our spare tubes as I had a rash of flats. Dave road back to the campground to get the car and I started walking. We spent some time that night patching our tubes and I never left on a ride without the patch kit after that. Luckily the ride was so awesome that I didn't even mind doing the 45 minutes of climbing again (and there was plenty more climbing after that).
Next we headed to Coed Y Brenin. We headed out on a ride called "The Beast" which was an ironic name because part way through the ride there was a Tea Shop. We couldn't pass up an opportunity to check that out so we stopped mid ride for a lovely scone with jam.
However, it was a long ride with lots of very, very rocky singletrack. I have to admit that this 40k ride left me plenty tired. Lots of climbing and lots of rocky singletrack where you had to be totally focused. Unfortunately we didn't really get any photos of a few of the craziest sections where the trail was built completely from stone. Dave and I were both too busy just surviving.
The next day we also rode at Coed Y Brenin but we did the Tawr trail which was a shorter trail. As I was in the parking lot getting ready to ride I was chatting with a guy. I told him I had ridden the Beast the day before and was heading out to do the Tawr trail. He commented that the Tawr had a lot of climbing. He wasn't just kidding. In reality I'm not sure if there was more than the other trails but my legs were starting to get tired and they sure felt it.
This is the start of the trail. Coed Y Brenin was all about biking as this was the start of the Tawr trail and all the other trails had a suspension fork at the start of the trail.
All the trails we did were very well marked either with colors or with markers like this with the Trail name. Not every section of singletrack had a name but many of them did. Here I am early in the ride before I crashed, hit the nose of my saddle against my hipbone and popped it off the rails. Luckily some people came along who had some velcro which actually held it on for the rest of the ride. I also broke a spoke but luckily it was the last day of riding and I didn't even notice the spoke until I got done with the ride.
In short Wales is an awesome place to go riding, camping, and sightseeing. The only downside is how weak the dollar is to the pound but if you camp and don't eat out much then it isn't a big problem. I had to laugh when we went through Customs we had less than $10 worth of items we were bringing back that we had purchased.
Driving on the left side of the road on narrow roads? If so, that is the case. Driving is on the left and there are tons of roads with two way traffic but only room for one car. Driving is never dull but you do get used to being on the left.
Maybe when you think of Wales you think of the Welsh language with all it's difficult to pronounce words. The signs in Wales are all in Welsh and English and Welsh does have a lot of words with few vowels and lots of consonants. Although only about 20% of people in Wales speak Welsh we heard plenty of it spoken.
Maybe when you think of Wales you think of castles. I think I saw a poster claiming that Wales has 641 castles.
Maybe you think of rural towns that have been around for a very long time. We certainly saw lots of those with buildings that were hundreds of years old.
You may also think of sheep when you hear of Wales. There are certainly lots of sheep in Wales as although farming has struggled to recover from Foot and Mouth disease it is still an important part of the culture and economy.
Maybe when you think of Wales you think of friendly people you might meet. We did meet plenty of friendly Welsh people but this picture is actually of some English blokes. These guys were from Manchester and we were lucky enough to be camped next to them for two nights. They had a roaring fire (a rarity in Wales), some beer and chairs so we imposed on them and they were kind enough to let us hang out with them. They were enjoying Bank Holiday Weekend and were on a mountain bike boys weekend.
Speaking of camping here is a shot of the campsite at Betws y Coed (pronounced bet us e coyd). It was jam packed the Saturday night we stayed there.
Here is one of the many grocery stores we visited on our trip. We only went into Port Talbort 3 times before we finally located the Tesco which is a big grocery store. We had some fun experiences looking for good places to buy a camp stove, towels, food, and other smaller items we didn't take with us.
Here we are enjoying some fine camping. Unlike all the other campers we didn't have a table or chairs but there is nothing like sitting on the ground and cooking up some food.
One campground was super deluxe and had 3 picnic tables and we were able to score one for ourselves so that night we actually didn't have to sit on the ground. We also would from time to time find a picnic area with a picnic table and we would cook there instead of at our campsite. You get creative when you're on the road.
Here's one of our deluxe dinner with pasta in a fancy tomato sauce with a roll and two drinks. Usually we just drank the Beck's that the Manchester blokes left us with but on this particular night we also had lemonade Fanta.
We camped one night at a farm campground outside Machynlleth (pronounced ma khun clyth). There were some people practicing their fire baton twirling which provided some good entertainment.
Our most deluxe campground (the one with picnic tables) had lots of crazy sculptures all over the property as well.
Oh yeah and there was a whole lot of riding to be done as well.
First was Cwm Carn (pronounced Quim Carn). It was an awesome trail and although I didn't ride it there was also a free ride park and a downhill trail. Here I am showing off one of the many styles of gates that there were to ride through.
Okay, so we didn't take a lot of photos of that trail as we were too busy having a blast riding it. So now for some photos from the Afan Forest trails. I think these are my favorite trails in Wales that we rode. There were 3 trails - Penhydd, The Wall and Whites Level. All started with long climbs but the downhill singletrack was so awesome that you didn't even care. I can't wait to go back and ride these trail again!
This section was for crossing a peat bog and it was a fairly long section with some tricky turns and as you can see also some twists. A couple of times I came pretty close to riding off the side.
Next up for us was heading north and riding at Nant Yr Arian. There was several ways to do this ride but Dave and I did the long ride which included lots of riding fire roads but also incorporated all the singletrack sections. You can do the singletrack in two other shorter rides but we were trying to do the most trails in the shortest amount of days.
After that we headed to Machynlleth which is a pretty cool town with an alternative technology center. We never got there since we were busy riding but we did go to the Farmer's Market which was in town the day we were there. The afternoon we got there we headed out to do the ride but after 45 minutes (of mostly climbing) we had exhausted all of our spare tubes as I had a rash of flats. Dave road back to the campground to get the car and I started walking. We spent some time that night patching our tubes and I never left on a ride without the patch kit after that. Luckily the ride was so awesome that I didn't even mind doing the 45 minutes of climbing again (and there was plenty more climbing after that).
Next we headed to Coed Y Brenin. We headed out on a ride called "The Beast" which was an ironic name because part way through the ride there was a Tea Shop. We couldn't pass up an opportunity to check that out so we stopped mid ride for a lovely scone with jam.
However, it was a long ride with lots of very, very rocky singletrack. I have to admit that this 40k ride left me plenty tired. Lots of climbing and lots of rocky singletrack where you had to be totally focused. Unfortunately we didn't really get any photos of a few of the craziest sections where the trail was built completely from stone. Dave and I were both too busy just surviving.
The next day we also rode at Coed Y Brenin but we did the Tawr trail which was a shorter trail. As I was in the parking lot getting ready to ride I was chatting with a guy. I told him I had ridden the Beast the day before and was heading out to do the Tawr trail. He commented that the Tawr had a lot of climbing. He wasn't just kidding. In reality I'm not sure if there was more than the other trails but my legs were starting to get tired and they sure felt it.
This is the start of the trail. Coed Y Brenin was all about biking as this was the start of the Tawr trail and all the other trails had a suspension fork at the start of the trail.
All the trails we did were very well marked either with colors or with markers like this with the Trail name. Not every section of singletrack had a name but many of them did. Here I am early in the ride before I crashed, hit the nose of my saddle against my hipbone and popped it off the rails. Luckily some people came along who had some velcro which actually held it on for the rest of the ride. I also broke a spoke but luckily it was the last day of riding and I didn't even notice the spoke until I got done with the ride.
In short Wales is an awesome place to go riding, camping, and sightseeing. The only downside is how weak the dollar is to the pound but if you camp and don't eat out much then it isn't a big problem. I had to laugh when we went through Customs we had less than $10 worth of items we were bringing back that we had purchased.
posted by MadCross at 4:50 PM
6 Comments:
Awesome adventures! I'm jealous!
That was great. Thanks for posting all those pics and telling your story! The scenery is breathtaking. I noticed the arm warmers - what was the temp. range there?
Ouch, your hipbone came off off its rails? And then you held together by velcro? You better have that looked at now that you're home.
Glad you had fun!!! ;-)
And have you ever noticed that Blogger word verification looks a lot like Welsh?
I don't think you were actually in Wales - it is not nearly rainy enough in your photos! :)
How lovely.
hiya its geoff one of the manchester guys! glad the beer helped im impressed with the amount of riding you did. glad the rain stayed off!!! hope you had a fab time in sunny england/wales.
heya renee and dave,
ts sid fro the english manchester lads. for all you bloggers im the short(five ft 9ins in heels) one on the far right of the picture.
just a quick one to say glad you enjoyed afan and i hope we can catch up with you guys in scotland next year.. the beers are on you hahaha. good ridin and happy trails guys.
s.
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