Carmarthenshire and Pembrokeshire Counties; July 2018
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Cornwall with Less People
Summer 2018 is turning out to be a record breaker and to be frank it’s been a bit too hot and sticky for riding. However, Monday and Tuesday, 30th and 31st July, were a nice couple of riding days with highs of 20 C and cool refreshing breezes. There were a few showers, some on the heavy side, but these were welcome too. It turned out to be a good couple of days to ride around the counties of Carmarthenshire and Pembrokeshire. I combined the two counties so that I had a good choice of landmarks. I booked a B&B just south of St David’s just before I left. The plan was to start east of Carmarthen at Paxton’s tower and ride a clockwise route around the two counties to finish south of Llandovery. I also planned to visit 3 RBR landmarks along the way.
After the tower it was onto Kidwelly and Laugharne castles. Both are nice spots. As well as the castle, Laugharne has Dylan Thomas’ boathouse and is one of the locations for the BBC series Keeping Faith that I’m currently watching. Next it was Pendine Sands where in days past British speedsters like Malcolm Campbell set land speed records on the 7 miles of firm flat sands. This year it was the fastest motorised wooden shed! On the way to the Pembrokeshire coast I stopped at Carrew Castle with its tidal mill and at Cresswell, a lovely spot on the estuary (I believe it’s a biker meeting place). As I passed through Pembroke I chose to ignore the castle there. There were enough castles on my route.
Access to St Govan’s chapel and the Stack Rocks is via an Army firing range and although I had no problems visiting them I think there may be times when the roads are shut. Both involved a short walk from a nearby car park. (The Green Bridge is adjacent to the Stack Rocks.) Crossing the Severn on my bike is free but taking the bridge north of Pembroke to cross the estuary cost me 35p (105p actually because of a problem with my route that required me to cross it 3 times).
It was a good ride to Saint Ann’s Head to see the first of two lighthouses on my route. Then it was on to my B&B just south of Saint David’s. After checking in there I popped into Saint David’s for some fish and chips. While I was there I visited the Bishop’s Palace and the ancient Saint Non’s chapel. Did you know that Saint David's is the UK's smallest city?
Next morning I left the B&B for Porthgain, a pretty little fishing port. The farm on the approach to Porthgain had deposited a liberal amount of slurry on the road so that made for bit of a buttock clenching moment. (I’ve crashed on that stuff before.) The ride to Strumble Head was nice if a bit challenging. Dougie Lampkin would have loved it. Strumble Head is quite exposed and just as I arrived, the big dark cloud that been tailing me arrived and unloaded. I stood there for 10 minutes in the lashing rain waiting for the cloud to move on. To be fair, that was the only shower I encountered that day but it was a doozy. With brooding shower clouds overhead, the lighthouse looked impressive sitting atop its little island. Great spot that.
From Strumble Head it was a nice ride down to Fishguard and the Mosaic on the Parrog. There’s a great view of Fishguard bay from there. It was then a short ride to Cwm-yr-Eglwys, another picturesque little cove. From there I rode some dodgy back roads to the ancient burial site Pentre Iran. It’s a short walk to the site itself. It was a lovely ride to the Preseli Hills which I had chosen for the great views.
It went a bit awry on the way to the Llys y Fran reservoir with my Garmin trying to take me down some tracks that offered a small probability of staying upright. I overrode the Garmin several times but it still managed to take me down a narrow lane that terminated in a grass verge and a hedge. Not good. The Varadero (and me) is definitely on the lardy side and trying to turn it around when it’s pointing downhill on dodgy ground is asking for trouble. After much tugging on the handlebars and a 100 point turn I somehow managed to turn it around. It turned out the reservoir was just the other side of the hedge.
The ride to the Peace Cairn across open moorland was much better than the ride to the reservoir although I did have a dodgy moment with a cattle grid. The men of Pembrokeshire council were cleaning the grid and had blocked it with their vacuum cleaner lorry. They directed me off-road to a narrow strip of mud adjacent to the cattle grid. I do like my Varadero but it's hopeless off-road so I wasn’t keen. However, eager to get on, I gave it a go and got stuck half way with the back wheel churning in the mud. I called to the nearest man for a shove and it was with some relief I made it back to the tarmac.
The nice moorland ride continued to the standing stones. There’s a couple of standing stones there, one honouring a Welshman called Waldo (not to be confused with Where’s Wally?) and the other noting that the stones for Stonehenge originated from these parts. (How did they get them to Wiltshire?) The ride to Newcastle Emlyn to visit the castle there and then to Talley Abbey was also enjoyable. However, on the way to Llandovery castle my Garmin again took me down some dodgy backroads and it was the same on the way to Careg Cennen castle. The dark and dank tree covered backroads liberally strewn with an assortment of gravel, rocks, potholes and general tree detritus were particularly nasty. All the time I'm watching for a tractor or a Landrover to appear around the corner. Mercifully, the ride on the mountain road to the end of my route was much more pleasant (although the speed limit is 40 mph, presumably because of the sheep).
My Garmin took me down so many dodgy backroads that I checked its navigation settings more than once to see if the correct calculation mode was set. It said it was but I’m not sure I believed it? The big Varadero is a bit of a handful when it’s not on tarmac and at the end of the route I was relieved to have kept it upright. With the general state of some of the roads and the farm "products" deposited at regular intervals it did make for some interesting riding at times. However, I really enjoyed my ride around Carmarthenshire and Pembrokeshire. They have some great scenery which is what I go for. As someone said, 'Pembrokeshire is like Cornwall without all the people'. The fresher weather made a big difference.
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