The aforementioned summer weather meant that packing even lighter than usual was a simple matter - Tarp? No. Waterproof? No. Spare clothes? No, not a single item. The clothes I had were the clothes I was wearing (which weren't many), I had a bivvy bag, summer sleeping bag and a 3/4 length Neo-air. A Ti mug and 8g stove would suffice for brewing up and a couple of butties and a few of Lidls finest cookies took care of any nutrition requirements. After a mandatory faff and a one last cup of tea we were off.
Bugeilyn ... be bolloxed.
The name Bugeilyn can strike fear into even the hardiest of riders, it's a place that's entered bikepacking folklore. A 7km stretch of mid-Wales bridleway that from the comfort of your sofa promises a serpentine singletrack through some of the wildest land in the country. The reality is something oh so very different ... think bog, think BIG BOG ... 7km of wet, unridable bog, just the kind of place where Type 3 fun lives, hiding in the knee deep tussocks and waiting to infect the mind of anyone stupid enough to be carrying / pulling / dragging their bike along its length. Well not today fella ... being summer I can only imagine that Type 3 fun had gone on holiday for a week or so and his affairs were being looked after by his altogether more pleasant sibling, Type 1. The world had been turned upside down, wet had become dry, slippy had been transformed into grippy and we were able to ride about 90% of the 7km, which is something I never thought I'd be able to say.
That's right, it's Bugeilyn and Matt's smiling!
No particular place to go.
Not having a route or destination combined with not giving a toss is a very liberating experience. After Bugeilyn we crossed the Afon Hengwm and contoured Nant-y-moch, if a track caught our eye or a trail tickled our imaginations we simply followed it ... you can't be lost if you're not trying to get anywhere. We started to slowly lose height and as the metres fell away the tell tale signs of civilisation started appearing, we'd had a brilliant afternoon but were now ready for a little sit down with a pint of coke.
The lure of a bothy containing 6, 18 year old female DoE participants doing their best to cool down, made the climb up to Nant Syddion quicker than usual ... the disapointment of finding the place empty was crushing but I consoled myself by eating cookies and telling Matt about the woman who hanged herself there after her husband and children died. By 11.30pm Debbie, Sharon, Jane, Becky, Rachel and Emma still hadn't turned up so we retired for the evening.
Matt acting as a midge magnet ouside Nant Syddion.
The mystery of Claerddu
Having Matt tell you that you snore is a wound that may never heal ... quite how he's able to tell someone else is snoring through the industrial din he produces is something I'm still trying to figure out. It was already warm at 8.00am as we rolled down the fireroad and away from the bothy ... it was bloody hot fifteen minutes later as gravity demanded payback and the climb out of the valley bottom began. At the top a spontaneous decision to follow a random singletrack through the trees was rewarded by the trail fairies and we were deposited on the edge of the forest exactly opposite a lovely bridleway I knew well ... we decided to ignore it. Instead of following the left track we went right down another bridleway that we guessed would bring us out somewhere 'useful'.
Remember kids ... red doesn't equal tan.
The morning carried on and the miles rolled away. As we approached Fair Rhos I knew we'd be turning left and onto the road / track through Tyfi Pools. It's somewhere Matt hadn't ridden before, so I was able to re-live seeing it for the first time through his eyes ... I'd forgotton just how spectacular it is. As we neared my 'turn left here for Claerddu bothy' mental marker, I realised that if Matt hadn't ridden along this roller-coaster road before, then it was doubtful that he'd visited the worlds poshest bothy either.
There was no sign of life as the bothy came into view, we crossed the stone bridge, opened the door and were hit by a literal heat wave. On one of the hottest days of the year someone had lit a fire! I pushed the door open and stepped inside, as my eyes adjusted to the light I fully expected to find the shrivelled, dried out remains of the firestarter, slumped over the table, pen in hand and bothy book opened in front of their beef jerky carcass, the words ... NEED WAT scribbled on the page. The fire in the range was roaring, it had obviously been fair chuffed up within the last hour but the fire was the only sign of life. There was nothing upstairs, no kit left for a returning wanderer, no personal items, absolutely no sign that anyone was planning to return or had been in residence within the last week let alone the last hour. We hadn't passed anyone on our approach to the bothy who was close enough to have built the fire and we didn't pass anyone in the opposite direction when we left ... spooky? Not really. Slightly unusual? Yes. Stupid? Most certainly.
Monks Trod ... the clue's in the name.
It would have been a fairly straight forward ride down the side of Claerwen, nice gravel doubletrack all the way with only a slight headwind to impede progress. However, the previous days exploits across Bugeilyn encouraged us to try a different approach ... the Monks Trod is an ancient road that was used by the monks of Strata Florida to reach their sheep walks high on the hills. Usually it's somewhere well worth avoiding, the nature of the land coupled with three decades of recreational 4x4 use had left the 'road' in tatters and largely unpassable ... we were hoping last years ban on motorised access and the prolonged dry spell might have improved things.
It seems that the actual location of the first part of the byway is in dispute and no one's really too sure quite where it ran. It is marked on the map but the cartogrophers crayon scribblings bear no relation to what exists on the ground ... we set a mental bearing and headed off towards the river crossing which would lead us onto the second, much more defined section. I can't tell you quite how long we pushed and carried our bikes for, maybe an hour, maybe three, it all became a bit of a blur but we did eventually reach the river and the start of the road proper. The sun was now doing its very best to melt us so we took the opportunity to remove shoes and have a paddle before we pressed on. We sat on the rocks in the middle of the river, dangled out white feet in the water and talked rubbish. The rubbish talking was brought to an abrupt end by me squeeling like a girl ... something (brave) was nibbling my foot. Closer inspection revealed that the shallow water was teeming with little fish, little fish who seemed to like the taste of hot sweaty feet.
Trod ... as in walking.
Fish pedicure over we reacquainted ourselves with socks and shoes and embarked on the slow climb out of the valley bottom. The Monks Trod Trudge winched us higher and higher until we eventually reached a ridge and what seemed like the top of the world. The green desert spread out in every direction, a carpet of tussocks, bog and nowt else, a 4 foot wide ribbon of track and occasional marker post would be our guide through the Elenydd. If we were wrong in our previous assumptions about the tracks state then the next 10km were going to call for the a new classification of fun ... Type 4.
The Monks Trod hasn't been this dry since 1867.
Luckily our slightly educated guess proved good and the gamble paid off. For the first time in a very long time, the Monks Trod was ridable, okay so it was vague in places and still a touch soggy in others but if you kept your eye on the ball you could ride it. The final kilometer descent down to Pont Elan was superb, tyres rolled easily on the hard surface, the Horse flies couldn't keep up and the dead sheep in the bottom of the ruts gave Matt something to bunnyhop.
We agreed that more cold Coke was in order, the nearest possible place to purchase such an item was located and we pedalled off in that direction. It was late afternoon now and we had no idea what time the visitor centre closed ... if it was 4.00 then we were already too late, if it was 5.00 then we might just make it. Three reservoirs stood between us and carbonated, sugary salvation, the going was easy but it's quite a distance so at Caban-coch I made a break and a sprint finish to the centre. They closed at half four, it was quarter to five, my puppy dog eyes, natural charm and sweat soaked jersey worked their magic and I emerged from the centre cafe victorious ... having the right money helped too.
The Pirates of Rhayader.
Matt rolled up to the centre seconds after and while rubbing the cold can around his face started to complain about his eyes and the right one in particular. He believed that a combination of hayfever, bright light, sun cream and possibly dehydration was causing his eyes to close up ... I just put it down to the fact he'd been living down south for too long.
We'd been out of food for a while and our water supplies were pretty much gone ... Rhayader had food and water and it was only five miles away. Matts eyes were getting pretty bad now and he was struggling to keep them open for longer than 20 seconds at a time but he managed to keep going without crashing into anything and we cruised down the main street 30 minutes later ... a pub was selected, drinks purchased and a menu found. We had a chat with a couple of lads riding fully loaded tourers who if their expressions were anything to go by obviously thought we'd escaped from somewhere but Matt wasn't his usual self. The eye situation was getting worse, he didn't really say much but rummaged about in his bag, produced his first aid kit and without any fuss knocked himself up a makeshift eye patch. The DIY patch wasn't the give away as to how much his eye was troubling him though ... it was the fact that he was willing to make himself look like such a tw*t in front of so many strangers! ... we probably needed a plan.
Parrot just out of shot.
We left the big city around 7.00, I had an overnight spot in mind but if the eye didn't improve I doubted we'd make it. As the miles ticked by the situation started to look brighter. We reached the point where we needed to turn off the road but instead we carried on, with our potential overnight venue behind us I wasn't quite sure where we'd end up. It was 9.00pm when I realised that Matt had a section of his brain missing, the part that calculates and remembers ascent. We'd arrived in Llangurig, the eye was much improved and Matt suggested we detour to Nant Rhys bothy because " it's not very far and pretty flat, reckon we could be there by 9.30" ... I calculated we'd be there around 10.30.
At 10.25 the gable end of the bothy came into view, it was pretty dark by now but the building stood out against the clear sky like a beacon. Sadly we'd missed all the DoE girls so had the place to ourselves ... within half an hour we were both unconcious.
Nant Rhys to home is conducted on full auto pilot, each turn is fully embedded in the knicker draw towards the back of my head that acts as a memory. Although uneventful the final morning of our trip was superb, the weather, scenery and feeling of freedom was almost enough to make us turn tail and head off somewhere else ... we didn't but it was a close run thing.
I've no idea how far we rode, how high we climbed or what our average speed was over the 3 days and I couldn't care less. Putting numbers onto a ride like this wouldn't add to it, only detract ... sometimes it really is about the journey, not the destination.
Thanks to Matt.
