Where was Erica? She spent the night in a parking area on the minor road that runs to the S of Llyn Celyn (W of Bala)
Weather: Daytime: Wall-to-wall sunshine, warm and (thankfully) the biting wind of last weekend had gone away. Night: A bit nippy. 0 degrees at 7am.
How do you get around the need to unpack at the end of a trip? You fail to pack for it in the first place!
Our failure to pack for this trip was definitely in the category of ‘pure comedy’.
In my defence: a) we’ve had a lot going on the last few weeks; and b) the main purpose of the trip was an overnight backpack for me, and had I gone by train, I wouldn’t have considered that I’d underpacked at all. With the benefit of hindsight, we should have delayed by another day, even though we’d already delayed by six, which would have given time to prepare properly.
As it was, such were the time pressures (admittedly some caused by my choice of what to do with the time I had available*), that it was gone 7pm on Tuesday before I even started packing my backpack. I figured everything else (including a couple of urgent unrelated admin tasks) could be sorted in the morning.
I woke yesterday morning and, 2.5 hours before our intended departure time, I impulsively decided not to proceed with the intended well-planned and researched trip to the W side of the Black Mountains, but instead to hastily plan something completely different. The revised plan took me about ten minutes, was entirely unresearched and was to take us to mid-Wales, W of Bala.
With admin tasks all done, I chucked a few things into a crate, failed to even glance at the Erica/Bertie packing checklist, and we were about ready to leave the house when I asked Mick if he was packing anything, suggesting that maybe he might want a pair of PJs and a pair of pants. That is literally what he picked up. This may sound scant, even for an overnight trip, but (if you ignore my backpack) it’s more than I thought about. On reflection, a change of clothes for the journey home would have been nice. As would have been a pair of PJs, as things worked out. Putting some water in Erica’s tank would have been good too. And a pillow: that would have added comfort for Mick.
A five minute detour to a Tesco to buy diesel turned into twenty-five, due to roadworks (we later passed a cheaper fuel station directly on our route). It was 1330 by the time we arrived in the layby from which I was going to be setting out.
After a spot of lunch, it was 1355 by the time I struck out up my first hill. Mick had, quite rightly, pointed out that I could do this one as an out-and-back without my pack, swinging back past Erica to pick it up before heading on to my second hill. Given the tinder-dry ground conditions, it was a comfort that in the next 1.5km I passed two streams that were running. It was false comfort, I didn’t pass another in the next 3.5 hours.
On my way to my final hill of the day, I’d seen where there was water further down the valley, so having bagged that final hill, I made my way down to the river.
Getting there involved crossing some really rough ground, a barbed wire fence then some ridiculously rough ground. I finally reached the water to see that it was barely moving and looked plain nasty. Worse, there was clearly not going to be anywhere remotely campable, even by my ‘chuck the tent up wherever’ standards. Worse still, I was now faced with trying to retrace my steps, or taking a more direct line back to the track … and on the direct line route stood two rows of commercial pine plantation, each only about 10-20m deep, but still as impenetrable as these things always are. I headed to the nearest side stream, hoping there would be a way through the trees there. I suppose there was, but it was a bash and a crawl and certainly not a responsible or sensible route.
Predictably, within two minutes of rejoining my intended route, after the nugatory 500m/20 minute detour, I found a side stream that was trickling. I could also see what appeared to be some abandoned mine buildings further up the hill that I thought might net a pitch out of sight of the farm house just 200m away. First, though, water. Oh, the joys of a brand new water filter! Our ten year old ones were well overdue replacement!**
As I completed my water faff, I contemplated the sense of backtracking uphill in the hope of finding a pitch, and checked the map for likely spots on my onwards route. It was at this point that I noticed I was only a 7.5km walk from where Erica was parked. It was now 7pm. Being all good track, it would take me a maximum of 1.5hours to cover that distance, which would see me there in the last dregs of daylight. I could faff around looking for a good pitch or I could have a nice comfortable night with Mick. Obviously, I opted for the latter.
It turned out the farm house I’d been concerned about was derelict (but with a new roof, hence fooling me). It also turned out that there was plenty of campable ground beyond it. However, it was lowland sheep-grazing land, in lambing season, and thus a shepherd was sure to make rounds both late and early. I never want to be found pitched where I shouldn’t be … and Erica was calling.
On the walk out to the road (still on my intended route), I got enough of a phone signal to convey to Mick where I was and to expect company for the night, but not enough signal to receive news as to whether he was going to hold tight or would drive along the road to meet me.
At a fork, had I taken the lower vehicle track I would have been on the road when Mick drove by. As it was, I was on an old grassy track, up above and paralleling the road – but at least I saw him, even if he didn’t see me. I scrambled down the bank and over the fence, and thus was standing in his path when he came back.
It was a late tea, and early to bed, and a superbly quiet*** and comfortable night.
We were away from our overnight spot early, and I was on my way up my first hill, just a few miles along the road, by 7am. Down from my second hill by 1130 (carrying water off the hill with me, so we could make drinks for the journey: see earlier mention of failing to even pack enough water for this 24-hour trip), it wasn’t long before we were on our way to Montford Bridge Café (by Shrewsbury) for lunch. We’d stopped in there last July and found it to be a gem, with excellent and plentiful food for a ridiculously low price. The prices have now gone up and the quality of the food (or at least, the quality of the cooking of it) has plummeted. Disappointing!
We were home by mid-afternoon.
(There will be more detail about the hills themselves at gayleybird.blogspot.com)
(*On the
day before departure I cooked and dehydrated six meals. I hadn’t been able to
find the bag of dehydrated lentils that I thought was left over from last
autumn, and if I was going to have the dehydrator running, then it made sense
to cook two different meals and put them all in at the same time, thus getting
a head start on preparing food for the TGO Challenge next month. I then found the missing bag of dried lentils, so didn't need any of those meals after all.
**The cheapest Sawyer Mini that I’ve seen on sale in the UK are £25 each, and from a source that I would trust not to be fake goods, they’re £35 each. I imported a pack of four from the USA for £54 delivered.
***Quiet except for the incident where I woke up to the sound of voices. No idea why my phone had decided to randomly start playing an audiobook, and my earphones were right next to me.)
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