Pushing my limits on Pen y Fan

Last Monday I fancied a challenge – something rather more ambitious that my usual hikes in the forest or beside the River Wye.  The weather forecast was excellent, so what could be better than climbing Pen y Fan, the highest mountain in South Wales?

I downloaded the Ordinance Survey map and studied it.  The easiest route looked to be one starting at Pont ar Daf car park, though at 2 miles up and 2 miles back again, it hardly seemed long enough for a day's outing. I therefore plotted a longer route, descending to the northwest of the mountain and returning along the Taff Trail.

I arrived at the car park just before midday and was surprised to find it almost full – just one little Bluebell-sized space left.  I squeezed Bluebell into it, donned my walking boots and rucksack, and set off.  By now the mid-day sun was blazing and I began to regret my choice of long-legged walking trousers.  Too late to change my mind now, though. Skirts and shorts had been left at home.

Locals call this path 'The Motorway'. It starts gently, but soon steepens.  My pace slowed.  Another half mile and it was down to crawling pace — 30 steps... pause... 30 steps... pause... 30 steps... sit down and rest. Fitter souls overtook me and some even ran past.  A mile and a half in, and everything ached but I was determined to press on.   30 more steps... pause... and so it went on, the summit getting ever closer.

Just before the summit, the path makes a welcome dip and my pace quickened.  One final push with my tired and aching legs, one last rest... and I made it! Here's the view from the top, looking north towards Brecon...

... and east, over Cribyn. I'd planned to eat my lunch here, but swarms of midges took rather too keen an interest in my cottage cheese – and my hair, arms and legs too – so I descended a bit and found a midge-free spot on the southern slope.

Slowly, my strength returned. Ahead of me lay Corn Du, which I was determined to climb but I also decided to abandon my original plan and shorten the walk considerably. After Corn Du, I would take the popular path down to The Storey Arms Centre, then join the Taff Trail for the short walk back to my car.

This is the view from Corn Du summit, looking back toward Pen y Fan. Corn Du is 13 metres lower than Pen y Fan, but there was a pleasant breeze blowing here, and consequently no midges. A good spot for another rest, before the homeward trek. 

The view from Corn Du, with the return path stretching out into the distance before me.

The whole walk, exhilarating though it undoubtedly was, proved to be much harder that I'd anticipated. My fitness app record says it all — a little under 5 miles at an abysmally slow speed of 1.3 mph, and that doesn't include long rests as the app stops recording if I remain stationary for more than a minute.

I've walked hills and mountains before, most frequently in the Lake District, but never in blazing sunshine, with temperatures in the mid 20s. I conclude that three things impaired my progress: 

• I wore the wrong clothing. My denim skirt or a pair of shorts would have been more sensible in that heat.

• I'm overweight. It would have been good not to have carried 2½ stone of surplus fat with me.

• I'm 67 years old. Though I was overtaken by many people on the long ascent, they all looked a lot younger than me.

Would I tackle Pen y Fan again? Most definitely, though only after my Slimming World group have seen me down to my target weight. And next time I'll probably plan to walk later in the day, rather than beneath the midday sun.  

One thing I can do nothing about is my advancing years, but neither will I use them as an excuse to stay in the valleys.   Well hopefully not for a while yet.

Sunsets

Late on clear summer evenings at mum and dad's hotel, a clutch of visitors would gather on the verandah, transfixed as the sun set over Newquay Bay, bathing the whole scene in orange light.  And though I'd seen it many times, I would often join them... and just watch.

It's the one thing about Cornwall that I miss the most, though sadly, I don't have a single photograph of that wonderful view over Porth Beach. When I was 21, I married and from then on had homes of my own, none of which enjoyed views of the coast.

It was really great, therefore, to witness two beautiful sunsets during my recent visit to Newquay – not over Porth Beach, but from my hotel bedroom in the town, overlooking Towan Beach.

The first is rather special. Pink sunsets are rare, even in sunny Cornwall, occurring when light is refracted by clouds high in the atmosphere.

The second is more typical of the sunsets that enthralled our visitors all those years ago. I love the way that the sun casts its beam of orange light over the sea.

Even after the sun has set, the colours remain for quite a long time, silhouetting the headland.

I couldn't resist adding this, one of my favourite Cornish sunset photos.  It's not of Newquay this time, but taken above the Crowns engine houses at Botallack, not far from Lands End.

One thing I never saw in Cornwall — for I always lived on the North coast — was a colourful sunrise. So this time it's my new home that scores the points.  This was the fabulous view from my kitchen window on January 14th this year.

I do see sunsets from my home too, but their beauty is mostly lost behind houses and forest trees. But if a good one is in prospect and I drive down to Lydney Harbour, what are my chances of seeing something equally colourful downriver? Surely worth a try.

Porth

Going 'home' to where I grew up and raised a family, was an odd experience. So much was unchanged; headlands that we walked, caves that we explored, the rock where I got stuck and nearly had to be rescued. Other places, though, have changed almost beyond recognition, as rolling acres of farmland have produced large crops of houses and once familiar palatial hotels have been demolished or redeveloped.  Even the hotel that was my childhood home lies derelict, awaiting the developer's bulldozer. 

For 20 years, Porth was my home beach and Porth Island my playground, where my friends and I hid amid Bronze Age earthworks and defended them against imagined invaders. To my mind it's a spectacularly beautiful place to while away a few hours in the summer sunshine. That I've been able to do so twice within the space of a few months is a bonus, particularly as the tide was out during the afternoon of my first visit, and in during the second.  These photographs are drawn from both occasions.

This narrow gap separates the mainland from Porth Island. When the tide is in and a storm is blowing, waves smash through here, throwing spray as high as that bridge. I know; I've stood there and received a face full.

The outgoing tide takes longer to clear the other end of the gap.  That's Norwegian Rock in the centre, though why it's so called is a mystery to me. I do know that a ship once foundered there, so perhaps that's the connexion. Like many rocks on that side of the headland, it's been disfigured by mining.

No sea spray today! Behind me is one of the Bronze Age ramparts and on the skyline a barrow (burial mound).

In this view, looking back towards the mainland, you can clearly see the ramparts on either side of the bridge, and a third line of defence running diagonally across the headland beyond them.

That dark cave-like shape in the cliff on the left has a story to tell...

Here's a closer look at it, to the right of Norwegian Rock. It's all that's left of the Banqueting Hall, a large cave, made still larger through mining, where concerts were once held.

I well remember entering the cave many times through a hole in the rock to the left of this old postcard photo. One winter's day, whilst carrying out an Auxiliary Coastguard patrol, I discovered that part of the roof had collapsed, leaving a dangerous hole in the ground above. The Council hastily erected a protective fence around it, but from that day the hall lost much of its magic as light streamed in from above.

Then, in 1987 the whole cave was deemed to be unsafe, so the company for whom I worked was called in to blow it up. (No, they didn't ask me to help!)  Many locals, and even an 'expert' I once spoke to, believe that the decision to destroy it was taken in haste and that the historic cave could have been saved.

At the end of Porth Island is the Blowing Hole. On this visit there was only enough swell running to produce a gentle mist, so to give you a taste of its ferocity, here's a photo that I took on New Year's Day 2008. Impressive, eh?

An older photo, probably taken in the 1980's and rescued from a deteriorating colour slide.

Finally, a look back towards Newquay

Slimming World

 I've succumbed.

A little over a year ago I successfully lost quite a lot of weight, getting myself from about a stone above the 'obese' threshold (BMI 30) to just below it. Then I got stuck.  Despite my (occasional) best efforts, my weight since then has gone up a bit, then down a bit, then up a bit again... but always within a few pounds of that obese level.  Not good.

Last week I concluded this term's ukulele lessons, which freed up Wednesday evenings, and it just so happened that a Slimming World group meets near my home on Wednesdays at 6pm.  I convinced myself — with more than a tiny nudge from the nurse at my health centre — to give it a try.

In return for a £10 joining fee I was introduced to Debra, the group leader, and given this collection of booklets. It all seemed dreadfully complicated, with free foods, healthy extras 'A', health extras 'B' and 30 pages of 'syns', but gradually it began to make some sort of sense in my fuddled brain.

This was the poster in the Joining Corner.  Just think - not
long from now I may look like the lady on the left!

For me, though, the really scary bit was when we all sat in a circle and openly listened to reports of one another's progress.  Up until now, losing weight has always been a private affair for me, discussed with no-one other than my spouse and perhaps a close friend or two. Not any more. Some in the group had done very well and were enthusiastically applauded; other less so, but still received sympathy and encouragement. It's a golden rule, by the way, that no-one is ever, ever humiliated.

After the scary bit, I was plonked on the scales and my starting weight recorded as 14st:0½lb. Debra agreed to my 'interim' target of 12st:3lb and explained that when I've lost 10% of my body weight (12st:8½lb) I'll be rewarded with a Club 10 certificate (and doubtless the congratulations of the group). Now there's something to aim for.

______

All that is, of course, the easy bit. Now comes the hard work of reforming my eating habits and sticking to the Slimming World plan. So for the past few days I've been avidly studying the Love Food booklet, looking up syn values online, planning meals and bidding farewell to some old favourites. So, for many a long month, it's 'hello' to healthy eating and 'goodbye' to chicken wrapped in puff pastry on Saturdays and quesadillas with Cheddar Cheese on Fridays. Sob!

The megalithic polo mint

As promised, here is what must surely be one of the oddest megalithic survivals in the land.

The origins of the Men-an-Tol (Cornish for stone - of the - hole) are lost in history, the favoured explanation being that they once formed a stone circle, perhaps with the holed stone in the centre, but were moved to mark a burial chamber entrance. More recently, parents used to pass their children three times through the 'polo mint' hole in order to cure rickets. Many years ago, we too encouraged our children (little persuasion needed!) to pass themselves through the hole and I'm pleased to report that they never did develop rickets.

When the site was first properly surveyed in 1749, the stones were not in line, but by 1864 they had been neatly arranged in their present formation.  Victorian passion for order, perhaps.

A short walk from the Men-an-Tol brought me to yet another standing stone - Men Scyfa (stone enscribed). The inscription, which proved hard to photograph clearly in heavy shadow, reads Rialobrani Cunovali fili. "That's not Cornish," I hear you say, and you'd be quite right.  It dates from the Early Medieval period (1000-1300AD) and means "Rialobranus son of Cunovalus," though who this father and son were, we may never know.

This illustration from Lake's Parochial History (1868) shows the writing more clearly than any photo of mine. Lake also records: "A miner, who had heard that crocks of gold were occasionally found under stone pillars, dug around the inscribed stone until he nearly lost his life by the fall of the huge mass. It was replaced in its original position about the year 1862."  Clearly he had a thing or two to lean about mining!

Finally, to round off my circular walk, here's the view as I approached the car park from the coast side,with the mighty Carn Galver in the background. 

Carn Galver, some fallen maidens and a mine called Ding Dong

The rocky trek on the way
to Carn Galver

A few places in Cornwall keep drawing me back. Some, such as the ones I shall describe in a future post, stir childhood and teenage memories of summers on the beach, sea salt in my hair and sandy hands clutching Cornish ice cream cornets. Others are more mysterious, far removed from the tourist trail, and of these my all-time favourite is the moorland around Carn Galver.

Many who drive along the picturesque, winding road between St Ives and Lands End, pass the long-extinct volcano of Carn Galver without giving it a second glance, save perhaps to gaze for a while at the derelict mine buildings at its foot. But those mine buildings stand beside a small car park and its there that my hike begins.

The climb up to Carn Galver is a rocky one, and a prickly one too as I thread my way through dense clumps of gorse but the view at the end is worth all the effort.

That's Pendeen Watch in the distance.  It's a view that may well be familiar to connoisseurs of the original Poldark series on BBC television.  Here's a picture from the opening sequence of the well-loved programmes, with the lighthouse of Pendeen Watch clearly visible.

I had to smile when so many people criticised the new Poldark series for featuring Trevose Head lighthouse, which was built some 60 years after Poldark's time. Well, the old series could be just as anachronistic! I think this Poldark view must have been taken from Zennor Hill, back in the St Ives direction, as that looks like Carn Galver on the right, in the middle distance.

From Carn Galver my route lay in a roughly southeasterly direction, back through all that prickly gorse and onward to firmer ground. It's odd, but in the few years since I moved from Cornwall I'd quite forgotten just how vivid were the colours of the wild flowers, and how strong their scent as it mingled with the salty sea air.

This ancient stone circle is The Nine Maidens.  Illogically, it used to comprise 22 granite blocks but, according to Wikipedia, only 10 survive.  I counted 11, though two were clearly fallen maidens.  And, as a friend later pointed out, a fallen maiden is no longer a maiden at all... which leaves 9. Perfect!

 Here's a closer look at one maiden and one disheveled old maid!

A little further along the track it can come as something of a surprise to realise that one has crossed from the Atlantic coast to views of Mounts Bay, with St Michael's Mount standing proud. Cornwall is very narrow at this point.

A couple more minutes' walk brought me to the delightfully named Ding Dong Mine, reputedly one of the oldest copper and tin mines in Cornwall. Production finally fizzled out in 1928. Unfortunately, the old engine house has recently suffered a spate of Health & Safety measures, with ugly metal fences baring access.  Perhaps someone was afraid that pussy would fall down the well.

Here are a couple of views from my last visit, in 2012, when folk were trusted to keep themselves safe. In the first you may just make out St Michael's Mount in the distance.

That's enough for this post. In the next one I'll continue the walk, lingering for a while to look at what is surely one of the oddest megalithic survivals in the land.