The Desert of Wales by Ron Trill

A few years ago, while returning from Pembroke, we stopped for the night at the village of Llanwrtyd Wells. Strolling round the place after settling in at the hotel, I spotted a signpost which simply said "Mountain road to Strata Florida". Reference to the map later showed that this was a version of the old Towy Valley route, which was a crossing of some of the most desolately beautiful countryside of what used to be called Cardiganshire, now made easy for the modern cycle tourist.

It was all very different in 1939, when it was one of the most famous rough stuff crossings in Wales and sometimes referred to as crossing the "Desert of Wales". About fourteen miles in length, it was called the "Towy Valley", although it started along the River Irfon and there were other tracks along and over Towy. In that year I planned to incorporate this route in a two week tour of Wales: Mitcheldean Y.H. (fourteen miles beyond Gloucester) on the first night, then a more leisurely forty miles to Crickhowel on the second day. The third day would take in the Towy Crossing , and as the next hostel after would be three miles north of Devils Bridge, it could be a very, very hard ride of about seventy miles.

From Crickhowel I rode up the Usk valley to Brecon, where I turned north for the climb, to nearly 1500 feet, over the Mynydd Epynt. It was late afternoon before I dropped down into Llanwrtyd Wells. No sign of a cup of tea there or at Abergwesyn, at 5 o'clock. The first three miles was along the Irfon valley and proved to be easy riding along a good cyclable track. Then came the ford across the Irfon. There had been a lot of rain previously and there were several inches of water in the ford which had a very rough, stony and unrideable bottom. So it was a matter of taking shoes off, tying laces together to hang shoes round my neck, socks in pocket and carrying bike on shoulder. A motorcyclist approached from the opposite direction and rode his large machine through the ford to draw up alongside. He had left Strata Florida at three o'clock, and it had taken him nearly three hours from there. He had had great difficulty in crossing the Towy which was in full spate, and advised me not to go on, but if I did so my first crossing would be the worst. There were four bends in about fifty yards and the track went straight through the middle of them, but a large tributary joined between the middle two fords so that the last two were not too difficult. It was also possible to avoid the middle two by keeping to a very narrow path between the river and a stout fence.

Leaving the ford, I followed the motor cyclist's trail over the Devil's Staircase and down into the Towy Valley proper. The surface was mostly bare rock and I walked a lot of it, losing a spoke and a sole from a shoe. There were some shrubs in blossom by the river and the sun, having been shining there for many hours, had drawn out the scent and now, at nearly seven o'clock in the evening, it was a very pleasant spot. From here it was possible to take the Tregaron Road which crossed the Towy by a stout brick bridge, but Tregaron was too far out of my way.

Again I followed the motor cyclist's trail, this time alongside the Towy, for two or three miles to the "Great Crossing". I could hear it long before I reached it. There were some large rocks in the river bed and normally the river would flow between them but now, in

flood, it was bounding over them, bouncing and splashing in many small cataracts. Downstream, the current was very strong and swift. It seemed best to cross by the rocks, so once again shoes and socks off. With the bike on my right shoulder I took one step and the water was up to my knees with a strong current. A second cautious step and the water was well above my knees. Very gingerly I edged my left foot forward. My toe found a rock. Slowly I brought my foot up, feeling with my toe, to the top of this rock. It was like a large step and I was soon standing in about six inches of water, and after the next step the water was even shallower. This pattern continued until I had crossed the fifteen or so feet of the river and hurled myself up the far bank, several feet further downstream than I had intended, such was the force of the current.

The rest was easy. I avoided the two middle fords as the motor cyclist had suggested and at the fourth ford, well, a stout wooden foot bridge had been recently erected. Looking ahead up the gently sloping hillside, I could see the track crossing the Towy many times and each time there was a similar foot bridge, and also each time the Towy was a little bit smaller. At the last crossing I did not need the bridge.

At the top I passed the entrance to Strata Florida abbey and there the track gave way to a tarred road and there also I said "Good-bye" to my friend the motor cyclist's trail, as fresh then as when it was made nearly six hours before. I did not make the youth hostel. It was a quarter to ten when I reached Devils Bridge, and suddenly I had had enough so I sought out a B and B at the Post Office, where even at that time of the evening the landlady provided a meal.

Fifteen years later I passed that way again. A bridge was being built over the Irfon, so I knew it was the last time that I would be riding that track. The Towy was quite tame this time so the crossing was easy. The foot bridges were still there, old friends but beginning to look their age. And I still could not work out how the motor cyclist had got his machine across.

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