Category Archives: Flickr

Pembrokeshire Coastal Path

We took advantage of the long Easter weekend to head West to Pembrokeshire and do a spot of walking to aid in my preparation for the 3 peaks, which is now only about 14 weeks away. We’d planned to do a small section of the Pembrokeshire Coastal Path which in full runs for 186 miles from St Dogmeals in the North to Amroth in the South, and as the name suggests, follows the coast as it winds round beaches, bays and cliffs.

One of our favourite places to visit is Bosheston and the lily ponds and Broadhaven beach, so we decided to park up at Broadhaven and walk to Stackpole Quay and back along the cliff tops.

I’ve highlighted the two points in the map below. I’m unsure of the total distance as on the way to Stackpole we cut off most of the headlands, but on the way back we walked all round them. I have a feeling it was probably around 7.5 miles in total.

The weather was windy and cold, but dry and sunny so we’d dressed accordingly wrapping up but also donning the sunglasses for the bright sunlight (cue me looking a bit like the guy from fonejacker)

I didn’t opt to take my full SLR camera but of course had my mobile on hand to take some snaps of the walk.

The first section involved walking down from the car park to Broadhaven beach and then across the beach and up the other side. This is the view back across Broadhaven once we’d crossed.

One of the many highlights of the walk is Barafundle Bay, a beautiful beach which is nicely secluded and a little walk away from the nearest car park. This is the view as you approach from the Broadhaven side.

And this is the view back across Barafundle Bay from the Stackpole side.

As you approach the beach from the Broadhaven side you have to drop down through a small wooded section to reach the beach. First you go through a stile and then down some steps through the trees. I really liked the curved shapes of the trees and branches, I imagined them being really eerie at night with a howling wind.

Once we’d reached Stackpole Quay it was time for a short stop and coffee break before turning back and retracing our steps.

On the way back I noticed quite a few of these markers all with unique numbers and labelled ‘Survey Marker’, I’m not quite sure what they’re used for, but kind of made a guess they’re used in ordnance survey mapping to calculate the lay of the land.

A close up of one of the markers.

The walk back took a lot longer as we weaved our way around the headlands and stopped to take more photos.

I also tried out a couple of panoramic photos to try and capture more of the surroundings. If you click on the images below, they’ll take you to flickr where you can view them larger to see more of the details.

A view looking toward one of the headlands.

Looking toward Broadhaven.

With all the photos done, all that was left to do was cross the beach and climb our way back up to the car park.

Thanks for reading,
Chris.

Pen Y Fan – Take Two

After my first successful trek to the summit of Pen Y Fan last Sunday, I decided to venture up again this weekend, with my Wife as my walking partner. The weather forecast was a little nicer than last week so I decided to pack my camera and tripod along with my other gear.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t track the walk on my phone using the Endomondo app this time as following a little accident I had with it last week, my Galaxy S2 has had to be sent off for some repairs. We did however track it on my Wife’s phone to keep a record of our time and distance.

There were loads of like minded walkers taking advantage of the warm spell of weather and when we arrived at the car park, there were only a couple of cars, but by the time we got back from our walk about midday, there wasn’t an empty space to be found.

The walk up took us around 55 minutes and although it was clear for most of the way up, just as we approached the summit, the fog rolled in to obscure the view. I guess I’ll have to keep doing the walk until I can actually see what the view is like from the top.

A little way down from the top, the view was a lot clearer and you could see trails of people worming their way up the path and the alternate loop route. As it was such a nice day and we wanted to push ourselves a little more, we decided to extend the walk to take in the loop that passes parallell with the path we’d taken and leads up to Pen Y Fan’s twin but slightly smaller peak of Corn Du.

Before heading off, I took a couple of photos with my camera. I sometimes find it a little struggle to capture the endless rolling landscape perfectly in a photo. I’ve experienced it before when I visited the Grand Canyon where the massive landscape goes on forever and it’s difficult to put it in to any sort of perspective.

I took this one looking back toward the path where you can see a few people making their way up or down to the summit. You’ll also notice the couple of spots of snow still hanging around but looking a bit dull and muddied now.

The other photo I took away from this trip is below and looks to the right of this view. The line you can see running up the middle of the middle hillside is part of the trail that leads up to Corn Du and the route we headed back on.

In the above photo where you can see the valley between the middle hillside and the far ridge, the A470 runs. It’s one of the main routes from North to South Wales and a really nice scenic drive from Cardiff to Brecon that passes the Brecon Beacons including mountains and reservoirs.

All in all, the walk took us about 2 and half hours to do 5.5 miles, but it wasn’t too hard going and was nice to get out and about and do some more training for the 3 peaks in June.

Thanks for reading,
Chris

Cardiff in the snow

I thought I’d pull together some bits from today into a quick roundup post including photos of Cardiff in the snow.

As predicted, South Wales was hit by some fairly heavy snow showers. It seems most were prepared for it as many people stayed away from work or braved the roads which had been well gritted by the council.

This instagram photo shows the view we woke up to this morning.

view of snow from window

Despite the warning it didn’t stop many panic buying with Tesco and other supermarkets across Cardiff and other South Wales areas running out of many basic items. A post from Yahoo News shows the extent of the demand for bread and milk.

I was ready for the trip to work this morning, having recently bought some new walking boots in preparation for taking on the Three Peaks Challenge this June. Despite getting to the train station on time, the trains weren’t running and I headed home to get a lift in to work in the car.

view of a train station in the snow

I decided to pack my camera in my bag as I knew there’d be an opportunity to take a couple of snow photos.

Quite a few people managed to brave the conditions and make their way into work, but with the conditions still causing issues we were sent home early in the afternoon to allow time to get home safe and sound. On my way to the train station I was able to grab a couple of photos.

Alley in the snow

A view down a typical alley running down the back of houses in Cardiff.

Bute Park

I’ve been admiring this view on my daily cycle to work, but it looked so different caked in snow. Lot’s of people had taken the time to build snow men, with many students having snowball fights whilst I walked through the park. You can just see one snowmen tucked away in the right of the image.

Llandaff Park

After getting the train home, my walk took me past this park in Llandaff where I saw this tree still caked in snow.

Tomorrow I’ll be hoping the snow sticks around for a bit so that we can dig the sled out of the attic and have a bit of fun.

Thanks for reading,
Chris