Glyndwr's Way - Wales - A Walker's Guidebook

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Section 2 - Felindre to Abbey-cwm-Hir

This section travels mostly through exposed moorland or upland pasturage and is more strenuous than the first section but only climbs to a total height of approximately 520m, the highest point being the trig point on Ysgwd-ffordd at about 470m.

The route starts on farmland then, after passing several trout ponds, crosses open moorland and upland pastures to Castell-y-blaidd. There are many fine views along the Gwenlas Brook valley and across mid-Wales before the route descends to Llanbadarn Fynydd, a village on the A483. This is a distance of about 12km or 7.5 miles.

Llanbadarn Fynydd has a village community shop with refreshments, a petrol station and a post office. There is also a public house offering accommodation.

After leaving the village, past the church, the route follows a road to leave by a farm lane which is followed to fields and eventually open moorland and the slopes of Moel Dod and Yr Allt before following a green lane to Tynypant. From here a road is followed for a short distance before joining a farm track onto the ridge walk to the trig point on Ysgwd-ffordd. From here the route drops steeply down about 200m in 0.5km (¼ mile) to Bachell Brook. A minor road is followed to Dyfaenor, which is an old manor house built with stones taken from the buildings of Abbey cwmhir.

The route now enters beech woods and eventually a conifer plantation track into Abbey-cwm-hir. Abbey-cwm-hir has a church and village pub and there is also a campsite among the ruins of the Abbey.

To begin this section from the crossroads in Felindre turn left and right into a farmyard. Go straight through the farmyard and turn right at the far end of the farmhouse. Climb uphill, following a track, go straight across at a crossroads and through a gate, which is not waymarked. Continue along the track, through a gate and across a field, staying on the track. Go through the next gate and continue uphill along a newly laid farm track, following the line of trees, to the corner of a field, go through a gate and then follow the track to Rhuvid. Go through a farmyard and climb diagonally uphill.

Continue walking through the farmland until a tarmac road is reached. Turn left onto this road and walk downhill.

Turn left off the road and go over the cattle grid, follow the track straight ahead following the waymarks over Gwenlas Brook. The normal red dotted line on the OS map has changed to a line of crosses; this signifies that the track is a BOAT (byway open to all traffic).

Contour around a hill to the right, keeping a pond on your right, and go uphill to a gate. Go through, continue uphill along a track, which leads into a small wood. Follow the track along the edge of the wood. The trees are mainly larch and Scots pine, the fallen trees are testament to the ferocious winds on this lonely hillside. Head through a gate at the top of the wood and continue uphill, over the brow of the hill to a waymark post, and from here go downhill to a gate. Go through and bear slightly right, contouring a small hill to a track. Walk across the track and, between the low hill on the left and Castell-y-blaidd on the right, follow the indistinct path to a group of trees.

Castell-y-blaidd translates as ‘wolf’s castle’ and has commanding views to the south and west. This hill fort is thought to have been constructed by the Normans as part of their defences in Wales as several tracks meet in the vicinity. Many place names in Wales refer to wolves, the last known wild wolves in the British Isles roamed the remote hillsides of Powys as late as the 17th century.

Move through a gate and straight uphill, on the brow of the hill bear right to a stile in the fence ahead. Go over and turn right onto a road. After passing a farm on the left, climb a stile in the hedge on the left and turn right and follow the hedge downhill to a gate. Go through this and follow the hedge of the field to a gate, through this, keeping the cattle grid on the right, go down a short lane to a stile, climb over onto the road and turn left to walk down to the A483 and Llanbadarn Fynydd.

Llanbadarn Fynydd is a small village on the busy A483 trunk road. There are a few houses, a church, a hotel offering guest accommodation and meals, a village store with a post office and a garage. It is thought the area around Llanbadarn Fynydd has connections with the Arthurian Mabinogion tale The Dream of Rhonabwy, and that as badarn or badon means ‘mount’ in Welsh, this is the Badon Mount in the tale. The area is surrounded by between 20 and 30 earthworks and the village is situated on a Roman road. There is an interesting monument beside the main road erected to William Pugh and his weighing machine!

At one time Glyndwr’s Way crossed the road here and went through the ford, but today’s walkers are spared wet feet and the Way now turns left to follow the A483 through the village, turning right just after the church. Go over the River Ithon, continue up past some houses, around a sharp left-hand bend to a waymarked turning off to the right. Follow the track to a gate and enter a field. Follow the fence on the left through two fields. Careful navigation is needed between here and the slopes of Yr Allt, especially if visibility is poor. Go over a stile and turn left to follow a fence to a stile. Go over this stile and onto common land. Keep to the path through the bracken. The path drops down onto marshy ground, bear off to the right to a wooden footbridge, and then head uphill along a path through the bracken on the slopes of Moel Dod. Continue on the well-waymarked path to a derelict cottage on the left. Cross the stile and go down the green lane to a farmyard, go through and continue along the track to a lane. Turn left and take the next turn right. Continue along this road until some woodland is reached. Here there is a waymark on the right. Follow this waymarked path across the top of Ysgwd-ffordd, passing a trig point on the right. The views are wonderful in all directions. Continue down to a waymark and a path to some woods on the right. Take this path through the woods and across a field. Turn left at the bottom, and right onto a lane, over a bridge and up to a road.

At the road, turn left and follow it for 2km (1.25 mile), going past farm buildings on the left. Shortly after this there is a waymark on the right. Take this path through a field into beech woods. Follow the path down over the bridge and bear immediately to the left of a house and go over a stile. Follow a fence on the right and then across a field to the next waymark. Before the house, go through a gate and across a field to the corner of the garden. Bear left, going through a gate in the corner of the field. Follow a forest track to a tarmac road. Bear left and then right at the junction. The road passes in front a building called The Hall; there is a benchmark in the wall of the grounds to The Hall. Benchmarks were cut into rock or stone, usually on churches or other buildings that would not be pulled down and indicated a known height or level on a line of levels. Mapmakers used them by fitting an angle-iron into the horizontal notch as a ‘bench’ or support for their levelling-staff. The broad arrow was the sign of the War Department (forerunner of the Ministry of Defence) that originally controlled the Ordnance Survey. The standard of Owain Glyndwr is normally hoisted on the flagpole in the grounds of The Hall.

On the left is a metal fence with a gate. Go through the gate and down to the abbey ruins at Abbey-cwm-hir.

Abbey-cwm-hir is a sombre place on a dull day due to the large amounts of forestry plantations on both sides of the valley. The Cistercian monks believed in austerity and hard work and so chose lonely Welsh valleys for their abbeys, making them into successful places of industry. They built corn mills, roads, houses, fish ponds and farm buildings. The monks started to build the abbey in the middle of the 12th century. The nave of the abbey was 242 feet long and would have been the fourth biggest nave in Britain – only Winchester, Durham and York being larger – if it had been completed, which it never was.

The Cistercian monks of Abbey-cwm-hir sided with Llywelyn ap Gruffudd in his stand against Edward I. Llywelyn was killed by the English and his head was taken to the King, but his body was buried here. Because the abbey is the last resting place of Llywelyn the Last, it was a shrine for all Welsh people, yet Owain Glyndwr sacked it in 1401, believing the monks to be in league with the English. Henry VIII demolished what was left during the Dissolution of the Monasteries. Five complete arches were taken to Llanidloes to enlarge the church there. Other remains can be found in surrounding houses. Little remains of the intended impressive building or of the other monastic buildings. This is a remote part of Wales and the monastery would have needed to be self-sufficient and had its own farm, mills and bakehouse. Walkers can camp among the ruins beside the Clywedog Brook from which the Cistercian monks caught fish.

The village has an inn boasting the uncommon name of Happy Union Inn with a very unusual inn sign. The church here was built in 1866 when the original church, built in 1680, became derelict and had to be demolished. The church was funded by the sister of the local squire. The lych-gate was erected in her memory in 1900. There are some unusual head stones in the churchyard including two Graves Commission memorials and painted cast iron head crosses.