Penrhys – Ton Pentre (again)

I’ve now had another look at the ridge above Penrhys with Ceri and Ron from Rhondda Cynon Taf.

Main aim was to look at the blocked section of path around SS 972 955, just above Pleasant View. We walked up to the ridge and back along the top footpath. The blocked section (probably about 200 yards) is now completely impassable, heavily overgrown with brambles. Clearing it would be a huge job – and keeping it clear would need local effort. The stiles are there

and there’s even a waymark at the bottom but that hasn’t helped. The problem is probably that where it joins Pleasant View it runs between a house and its garage. Walking through people’s gardens is always difficult. An informal alternative (marked as a track on the online Ordnance Survey but not on the latest printed version) runs east from the blockage and down to the entrance to the quarry. From there you follow a very well-marked track down to the other end of Pleasant View. This runs through open access land but there are difficulties in waymarking routes through open access that aren’t rights of way. There is an alternative. On the way up, Ron’s pathfinding skills took us along most of the line of the lower footpath. I have tried and failed to find this in the past. It contours over some very uneven ground (the result of at least one landslip) and eventually joins the upper footpath near the top of Cwm Bodringallt. We lost the path at the end and walked up the bridleway from Cwm Bodringallt but Ron felt it would be possible to follow it down from the top using GPS then to waymark it. That looks like the best option. You would start up the ridge on the route described in https://heritagetortoise.wordpress.com/2014/09/04/on-from-penrhys/ . When you cross the stream at SS 982 959 bear slightly to the left to pick up the lower path. There are several places where the track seems to go on but you need to bear left down the slope – these will need waymarking. Eventually you join the well-walked track below the quarry and follow it down to the south-east end of Pleasant View at SS 973 954. Job done (almost). Route now clear Llantarnam – Margam (Caerphilly might be persuaded to do a bit of maintenance to the Raven Walk over Mynydd Machen. Ceredigion pretty much done. Volunteers forging ahead in Denbighshire and Flintshire. Web site nearly finished. What do we move on to next?