Pen y Garn and a Huge Windfarm

Saturday 14th September 2013 

An evening ascent of Pen y Garn from the south by way of the Ystwyth Forest 

Distance: 8.5km; Ascent: 300m; Sunny; Solo

See tracked route in new window

After my first walk of the day, I drove south from Nant y Moch Reservoir and set off walking from the corner of a minor road near Cwmystwyth at around 5pm.  A footpath led me into the Ystwyth Forest, where I picked up one of the many forest roads and began to gradually ascend.

On one of the forest roads in the Ystwyth Forest

Near the highest point of the forest road, a gap in the trees revealed a good view down into the Nant Rhuddnant gorge, and a short while further on the first wind turbine came into view.

View down to the steep sided Nant Rhuddnant valley

First sighting of a wind turbine

After a few hundred metres I left the main track at a junction where I forked right to begin to ascend up the northern slopes of Pen y Garn.  The wind turbines were now very close and they seemed out of place on this this otherwise remote high moorland.

Cefn Croes Windfarm

Looking north towards Pumlumon from Pen y Garn

I could make out the Pumlumon hills to the north, where I had been walking earlier in the day.  Soon I reached the top of Pen y Garn (Marilyn, Nuttall), where there was a trigpoint together with quite an elaborate windshelter cairn.  The trigpoint also had what looked to be its original OS plug, which I think is the first time I've seen one; pretty much all the other trigpoints I've visited either just had a hole in the top or it had been filled with concrete.

OS trigpoint on Pen y Garn

Elaborate windshelter on Pen y Garn

Pen y Garn trigpoint with the windfarm very close

On the actual summit of Pen y Garn

After a quick rest I visited the actual summit, which seemed to be somewhere near a gate a short distance away from the trigpoint.  There were good views from up here, although they were spoilt somewhat by the Cefn Croes windfarm, the closest turbine of which is only a few hundred metres away from the summit of Pen y Garn.

Lovely light on the descent from Pen y Garn

I descended southwards along the ridge to reach a vehicle track, which I followed down into Cwm Perfedd.  The light on the hills and clouds just before and just after sunset was excellent this evening!  So I spent a while trying to capture the best of it on my camera.  A track through the fields then brought me to the road a few metres away from my start point at around 7:30pm after a pleasant evening walk.

Sunset

Pink clouds over Cwm Perfedd

See also my Social Hiking live map from the walk.