Yesterday I met Tellytubby and we drove to Llanefydd to do a walk that I hadn’t done before. It’s a circular walk that we started from the car park in the village but first we had a look at St Mary’s Church and then the Hawk & Buckle and then headed back on the road towards Llanfair TH. We hadn’t gone far before we stopped to look at hundreds of House Sparrows on top of a roadside hedge, neither of us had ever seen so many in one spot before, it was just incredible to watch. It wasn’t much longer before we stopped to admire a wooden building built for the local football team. It was very impressive considering the size of the small village. Shortly after that we took the public footpath across open farmland that was to take us up to Mynydd Y Gaer and the Iron Age hill fort.
We were so fortunate at the top because the visibility was excellent and we could clearly see Snowdon and the Glyderau to the west. Cumbria to the north and the Wirral Peninsula and the Clwydian Hills to the east. No wonder this landscape inspired the 19th century poet and Jesuit Priest Gerard Manley Hopkins to write “ In the valley of the Elwy”
We wandered around the ramparts of the fort before making our way down through the bracken and the woods and crossing a footbridge and came to a large Oak tree where we sat under and enjoyed our refreshments in the warm sunshine. Once refreshed we set off across the field and then made our way across a new plantation of mixed deciduous trees that were planted on the hillside. A bit of a pull up the hillside took us to a lane which we followed down hill to a lovely arched bridge that crossed the River Elwy. We took some photos of the bridge and the nice caravan site opposite and it was just as well that we had a breather there because there was a long and very steep pull ahead of us. After puffing and panting our way to the top of the hill we took a public footpath on the right that came out on the road back to Llanefydd which we followed it back to the village. We had to laugh when we got to the car park as my walking book gave the walk as two and a half miles, Tellytubbys book gave it at 5 miles and yet the GPS was showing seven and a half miles! Whatever the distance was we still had a really good and enjoyable walk.