I got into Wales from my front door twice this year. The first trip isn’t the one I’m writing up here but it was the one that had the most impact on my year (if we’re doing annual reviews). I turned back after 2 days after continually struggling to climb without a building back tension that made riding uncomfortable. It was the first ride I’d bailed on. I’ve limped home from rides many times before but this was the first multi-day trip that I’d had to quit on and I wasn’t happy about it. 2022 wasn’t generally a great year fitness and riding-wise and jumping into a hilly 6-day ride after a generally fairly low mileage spring just ended up that way. Still, it was a good ride – I hike-a-biked onto the top of the Brecons in the evening sunshine and rode very slowly down (gravel bike) at dusk, I rode west on new roads that I want to return to and I cut the ride short around Abergwesyn and rode towards Built Wells then Hay on Wye and home. I took a different route over Gospel Pass on the way back that had me hauling on the bars to keep going (there’s 2 EV2 routes up Gospel Pass, the one to the SW goes up at about 16% for a few 100 yds) and I managed to save my back by taking the strain with my arms. Some progress and not all lost, was how it felt. The main takeaway from this ride was that age and mileage catches up with us and I had some work to do, perhaps it was time to do more than ‘just ride’ and hope to maintain long-ride conditioning.
In September of (most) recent years it’s been Torino-Nice Rally time. I love that ride and get so much out of it, despite the unsustainable and frustrating time suck and general risky business that it seems to be. 2021 was no-go fro many of us from the UK due to Covid restrictions so 2022 was going to be about making up for lost travel time. I’d gone off the idea of flying and getting there any other way (road trip!) wasn’t working out. Plus, I wasn’t confident I could pedal uphill for about 50% of each day for the 5 or 6 days I’d have to do the ride. So I dithered on booking time off from work and then an important guy from the USA was visiting the UK arm of my employer that week and that was it, no TNR for me. He then cancelled his trip about 2 weeks before it was due.. I decided to get another Wales ride in instead. If I wasn’t feeling it, it would a lot easier to bail and come home from Wales than somewhere between Turin and Nice.
I had the urge to ride my MTB again. Most of my bikepacking miles are done on my 650B gravel-ish bike which has a dynamo, USB out and all the mod cons that make touring ‘unplugged’ from civilisation so easy and it’s pretty good off-road. It’s no MTB though and I’d been missing the hooning descents. My MTB has no dynamo so I’d need a power bank to keep the Garmin running (I was happy to realise all my past trips on the MTB, between 3 and 17 days, had been GPS free or done on one charge and mainly free-riding rather than map following). I had an Exposure light with a Smart Port USB out and I could stop at the café in Coed-y-Brenin and to recharge everything after a few days.
I’d never ridden the Trans-Cambrian Way and I’d also been looking at the Bear Bones route here and there for a long time. I put together a ride that got me to Knighton on the lanes, across Wales on the TCW then followed the Big Bear route up to N Wales around Penmachno. On the return leg I hoped to leave the Big Bear to go across the Wayfarer’s track before heading back towards central Wales, a bit of Offa’s Bike and Knighton again, then home via Gospel Pass.
I’d fitted some Vittoria Terreno Dry 2.25 tyres and knew I’d probably kissed goodbye to any continued good weather in doing so. It’d been a hot dry summer and they were amazingly fast tyres locally while getting used to them and making sure they were all sealed up but it felt like a gamble for a week in Wales. The thing is, I hate tyre buzz on tarmac and this route would be >800km in total with about 60-65% of it on the lanes. If the gamble paid off the bike and route would be so good together. If not, well I wasn’t really looking forward to riding back to back days in the rain anyway so not much to lose.
Apart from a little diversion around the south side of Gospel Pass and a steep sketchy slide of a descent (footpath, damp grass and those tyres) on the way down I was on tarmac all the way to Knighton. Passing through Hay on Wye was a reminder to pick up a book for the trip, there’s some good bookshops there (in case you didn’t know!) but there’s also phone boxes and bus stops full of them. I’m tight so I decided to grab the first book I thought I could get through in 6 days of bivies, not looking at the topic to closely. I picked up a small book with a title that grabbed my attention. It was about clinical depression. I was about to put it back but I thought I should go with it – it was a topic I knew little about and maybe I’d learn something. Certainly it was different to the books I’d usually read. My sister is a Psychologist so I thought it might give me an insight into some of the work she does and hey, it was free. If not good I’d swap it at another phonebox bookstore.
I got to Knighton as the boy racers were warming up and the teenagers were getting their spliffs blazing. Standard small town centre feel (and smell) after 9pm. I got food at the Spa/Co-op/Nissa, whichever one it was, and went to find a bivi spot with a bit of shelter not far from the train station and the official TCW start.
Day one ‘proper’ on the route started grimly. Fine, dense drizzle and tyre cursing because the first few miles off-road on the TCW are grassy hillsides and hill tops. Slippy when wet and covered in sheep sub standard.The water sprayed from my tyres was green and it wasn’t the grass doing that. I know Wales has a lot of sheep but the density of the stuff here was surreal. The route took me onto purple heather covered hillsides, farm lanes and rocky byways. My feet were wet, my bike was filthy and the brakes were howling. It felt like proper XC in Wales and I was very happy. The riding was a real mix and then I popped out to descend a swine of a hill that I recognised from going up it a couple of times, outside Rhayader. Bought some lube from Clive Powell, thanked him for my trial by fire in long-distance XC at the Builth Wells Kona 100 many years ago and rode around the side of a very low Claerwen reservoir. The section past Tefi pools always has me stopped and in love with the desolate feel of the place. The ride into Cwm Ystwyth is a cracker and included the best descent of the TCW, the kind of fast singletrack descent through the forest that would make hauling an MTB all that way worth it.
I was short on options for food here so I went off-route to the pub/restaurant at Devil’s Bridge for a proper dinner. It wasn’t a late finish and I had time to ride slowly back up the hill after food and a pint, to the car park at the top where there was flat grass near a picnic bench. The weather was clearing and it looked promising for the next day.
I read some more of the book which was proving to be far more readable and interesting than I first thought. I guess like many people lucky enough not to suffer from mental illness it’s a difficult topic to engage with and at first it seemed a mis-match to be reading about one man’s struggle with depression as I pedalled around Wales, carefree and able. I’d thought about some of what I’d read the night before as I rode that first day on the TCW and the contrasts were clear. I realised bike touring is something that (for me, at least?) takes a certain amount of hope and optimism. Like my tyre choice, or the time when I toured Wales without any tent or tarp and found bivi-ing a bit of a damp challenge, I always hope for the best and plan for something worse, to a point. Essentially it’s an act of faith and optimism and one thing I’d realised from the book so far was that real depression was the loss of the ability to think that way. I was thinking about better weather tomorrow and that alone was part of a generally positive frame of mind. I appreciated that and had a good night’s sleep.
In the morning I started to make a brew and a porridge pot while a robin hung out waiting for its share. It’d got tame and used to snacks but it was also fussy, it wasn’t interested in porridge or soreen. It posed for a few (bad) pictures though and sang a bit for anyone listening, a lovely little thing.
I was in my own world that morning. I rode up into the Ystwyth valley and agreed with previous impressions that it was one of my favourite roads anywhere. Just beautiful. The sun was showing from time to time and I turned up Mohican Road and remembered it from the TINAT. I hadn’t remembered it as a road just off the main Ystwyth valley road, yet there it was. The TINAT was a great initiation to road riding in Wales – every time I go back there I cross some part of that route and wonder how on earth we rode so far and wide in one blur. I chatted for a while with a visiting German chap walking his dog and missed my turn and carried on to the top of the climb. Kidded myself that I meant to ride all of the road for the TINAT memories then went all the way back down to the river to pick up a great forest access road, back on the TCW again.
I rode a section that Zippy, Ben and I rode on the WRT a few years ago, then onto that stunning high track just south of Dylife that passes the ‘Alpine lake’.
Drank some water from a high stream and sketched-it down a steep, loose track where I feared for my tyres. The end of the TCW is pretty much in sight here but there’s a meandering finish, a lovely end to a ride that I wanted more of. It was early afternoon and I had expected to be on the route for longer, though I suppose at 100 or so miles it’s relatively short. I thought about Matt Page’s FKT and what a ride that was – more so by the way he just seems to get on and do these things consistently and has been doing so for many years. I replayed some of my ride in mind alongside bits I remembered from the video he posted. It had been all I hoped for – some familiar places linked up in unfamiliar ways, a real mix of riding and a true ‘best of’ type of experience. 100% the right decision to take the 29er too.
After Dovey Junction I rode along the coast road toward Aberdyfi, feeling a strange sense of a ride completed with satisfaction but it also being a ride within a ride. I’ve felt this before and had mapped out the coast road section as a change of scenery, a break from the mountains before heading back inland. The sun was shining, the road was quiet and flat and everything was good. I called in at another TINAT spot, the shop in Tywyn. I ate similar things as my last visit and filled up my bottles a bit further up the road. The route along Sustrans 82 heading back into the hills above Barmouth is beautiful and it felt great to have had some easy miles and now be heading upwards again with food for a bivi spot and a cold beer wrapped in a down jacket. There’s a certain tension in the late afternoon on a ride like this that comes from my stomach. It’s a concern that the evening won’t provide a good dinner because my ability to plan a route via convenient stops is non-existent, I just ride and hope something will appear on-route around 6-8pm. It was 6pm and I was already stocked up, so at 7pm I stopped on the high byway looking down towards Barmouth and decided it was the perfect place to watch the sun set, read some more, enjoy a cold beer and then eat dinner. It was actually a poor place to pitch a shelter (Gatewood) but I was out of the wind and comfy enough.
The morning was a bit dreary and it had drizzled overnight, it then started raining again as I starting the day with a freewheel along the track and down the lanes to Dolgellau. I made it as far as the carpark with a toilet shelter without becoming too wet and thought I’d stop there for a bit. If I’d carried on a bit further I could have sat at the Coed-Y-Brenin recharging both stomach and batteries but for some reason I thought getting out of the increasingly heavy rain was most important. I sat around for an hour and a half under the eaves, reading and making coffee. The book was continuingly interesting. It was a series of short stories, essays, lists and other expressions of the author’s experiences and it was well-written. As I read more I felt more convinced that, though I’d had a period of being stressed with a house move related to a job with a company that was going from bad to worse, then got out of that job in the midst of covid, injury, waning fitness and dealing with elements of burn-out, then having to bail on the ride that should have helped me reset and the general slump in stoke for life that went with the subsequent lack of activity, I wasn’t in way ‘depressed’. It was an affirming realisation. I felt grateful for my situation and the perspective on it the book had given me, rather than any downer brought on by the book’s subject. And I’m conscious of what I’m saying here possibly seeming clueless to anyone who has suffered from depression - I suppose I tried to understand how hard it must be when I thought of it as a loss of the spark and flame that inspires positive things in my life and realised it’s not just something we always have. With that the book was making me appreciate the ride more.
Coed-Y-Brenin trails then a panini and battery packs charged which needed a second hot drink and more time off the bike. My route then took me off the Big Bear as I wanted to go along the B4391 and B4407 heading east – the 4407 is a real gem of the open road type and I’d mapped out a way to get onto it by heading across a forest track rather than the main road into Bala. Just a couple of miles of mystery path and some short-cutting across a forest.
After almost two hours of deep moss sponge deadfall thicket I was fucking-this and bollocks-to-that-ing out loud and genuinely taking care not to break my ankle in a few square miles of plantation that would be really embarrassing to need to be rescued from, but I could see it happening. It was like the depths of the BC backcountry. That bit of the route where I would go up a track then over the open tops and ‘just’ straight-line a km or so of mystery forest - ‘it’ll be ok’.. Optimism now causing some real discomfort. I was shouldering the bike all the way or holding it above my head at times as I trudged through ground that varied in height by 2ft or more every other step. Thick moss and tufts covered half of the ground and dead trees and stumps covered the rest. Trees blocked my way often and I ended up following a deep, 2ft wide gulley stream of some sorts hoping it was the mini valley that would take me to the track that would then lead me south to the main road. Not the road to the north that I wanted, but it would at least get me out of that little piece of dense backcoutry hell. I’d enjoyed the wild adventure for about half an hour, then it got to the ankle-twisting shin scraping hike-a-bike stumblefucking stage and I was over it with most of the way out still to go. I got back to the road almost 3 hours after leaving it, a short-cut that had taken that long to cut 4km of main road. You learn.. And I could almost hear some of you lot on here laughing.
Anyway, the rest of that low-mileage day went ok. The sun was out and the Big Bear route took me on some great tracks. I had been hoping to get over the Wayfarer track that evening but it was dark by the time I started up the west side of the track, after I’d stopped for a pub dinner then had a bit of route-finding difficulty at a farm. I found a great pitch for the Gatewood once on the Wayfarer track and was just settling down in my bag when some really bright lights came up the track. I was rehearsing my ‘I got lost and tired, just kipping here for a bit?’ line for the farmer but it was just a few guys in Land Rovers driving over the Berwyns at night, as you do.
Next day’s highlight was the old ladies’ cake stall at the church in Llanrhaeder-ym-Mochant. Second breakfast bingo... I shopped well. The café there was a real classic too. A post office and café in what seemed like someone’s front room when the business was closed. I waited for a coffee while she dual-tasked as post mistress and sat outside among a house clearance sale stall to eat my cakes and drink coffee.
Wahey!
I ate enough cake to justify (necessitate) not going over the 600m byway between Bala and Vyrnwy, an area I’d bivied before and wanted to ride across. Next time maybe. The unsurfaced road I took from Penygarnedd to Vyrnwy was a real gem though, a beautiful route (look about 1km SW of Hirnant). I stopped for a coke and snack at Dafarn Newydd Stores, the owners there are friendly and supportive of the TINAT and other events and we sat outside in the sun chatting for a bit with a woman on a borrowed bike doing a lap of the lake. The lake was low and there were signs of the old valley road and buildings just at the surface.
From the road at the end of Vyrnwy it was a quick out-loud aaaaarrrgghhwooooohoo! drop down Bwlch Y Groes at just over 50mph and back onto the tracks that may have been in the Big Bear or Offa’s Bike, I was losing track of the source of my tracks by now. A cycle of road, track up to ~500m, descend, road, repeat. It’s also a bit of a blur in memory. I’d added in a few sections that I thought work checking out and not all were legal or open. One of the road alternates took me up a lovely valley heading SW from Llangadfan that seemed familiar. The TINAT route again, really? Seems so.
One real highlight was the Kerry Ridgeway section, the views were stunning and the riding after that was beautiful. I spoke to a farmer whose family had owned a farm on the high ground there for generations and we agreed on how lucky he was in life. He said that things were getting harder for him in recent years but it was clear he loved being there.
I was back in Knighton not long after that. It was lunchtime and I got a good meal at the café while my batteries went on charge for only the second time that trip. There was a feeling of the end of the ride as well as almost 200km to go to get home. I did go to the train station but it was a bank holiday or a strike day and no trains were running. The ride home was slow and steady, the lanes around Hay were a bit samey as they have been before on the way home and I failed to find a great last night bivi spot outside Abergavenny. It was ok though, I was well stocked with food and 2 beers that evening, proper luxury. I intended to stop early and finish my book then ride another few hours the next day rather than haul it to be home that night about 9.30-10pm.
I got on the bike that last morning and felt really slow. It wasn’t through fatigue, though I was tired after the first decent distance bivi trip in a year of relatively low miles. It was more a lovely sense of relaxation. I took that as a sign of a good ride, one where all had worked out well (apart from that forest short-cut). I stopped in a sunny Chepstow for a coke and snacks and was home by early afternoon after the slowest and most enjoyable 100km on the lanes that I’ve ridden in some time.
Chepstow, coke stop and NDS photo. Camera packed up on day 2 so I just have these phone pics.
The book was called ‘Reasons To Stay Alive’ by Matt Haig. Recommended – a very digestible format and it’s well written. If anyone wants it just PM, happy to send it on.
I can picture the forest, I've been caught out like that myself, I only wanted to go a couple of hundred metres to avoid riding back the way I'd come (went exploring and it was a dead end) but once off piste progress was nearly impossible and I thought I might never get out, it's funny now but at the time I was cursing, a lot and out loud 
Character forming. I still hate them... 
