Climbing Twmbarlwm

I've wanted to climb Twmbarlwm in South Wales for some time - ever since its distinctive outline, which you can see from many places on our side of the Severn, was pointed out to me. Ideally, I would have gone with Dru Marland, as it is deep in Dru Marland Country, but these days she's headed east on the Kennet and Avon and somewhere in the Vale of Pewsey, so I went with my boys and our dogs instead. (And fine companions they were.)

First, though, we made a return visit to Caerleon - not to follow the whole route we walked three weeks ago, but just to see if the bluebells that grow all over the hill fort on the ridge at the back of the town were out yet. 

This has been a difficult spring to predict, what with the effect of all that late snow, but in this, our timing was spot on. 

Great waves of bluebells rolling over the ramparts of the hill fort ...

... and so beautiful. 

But we had a mountain - or at least, a sizeable hill - to climb, so after three quarters of an hour or so we headed west to our starting point at Cwmcarn Visitor Centre. 

I have to say, it was hard going, but fortunately for me, there were plenty of reasons to pause and take photos. 

On the way up we bumped into David Hockney. (Not really.) 

It was getting really tough now. Luckily, there was a raven overhead, chiding me into keeping going.

Bilberries - or whinberries - and very shouty larks

Eventually we reached the outer ramparts of the hill fort, which - like the one at Caerleon - is believed to have been constructed between 500 and 150BC by the Silures, a fierce Celtic tribe ...

... and then - with much relief - the trig point on the summit.

Brean Down, Steep Holm and Flat Holm in the far distance

There's a rather prominent tump on top of Twmbarlwm. 

Its origin is something of a mystery. It might have been built by the Romans as a signal tower after they defeated the Silures in the area ... 

... or possibly by the Normans during the invasion of South Wales in 1070, as a temporary motte and bailey structure. 

A small shrine to another mother and grandmother reminded us of a Welsh nanna who might have been celebrating her 97th birthday at that very moment in whichever place she is now. (Another mystery.)

Too soon it was time to go. We took in the last of the views, over to the River Severn and the two Severn bridges in the distance ... 

... and Ted had a final puddle about.

Then it was all the way back down, far quicker, admittedly, than the ascent but - in my case - on jelly legs with toes crunched against the toecaps of my boots.

Loquacious raven alert 

Next time I might just take advantage of the car park near the summit, the existence of which we only realised once we were up there ... 

... because, in the words of Son the Younger, You've done it now, Mum. 

Romans, Knights and Pwca

Time for Son the Younger and me to take the two dogs for a walk. We'd been hoping it would be nice enough to go to the beach, but it wasn't, so we crossed the water and went for a walk in Caerleon, just outside Newport.

Caerleon is famed for its Roman remains. I hadn't been there since I was at school. We had quite a walk ahead of us, though, so we made do with a flying visit to the amphitheatre ...

... which was built to serve the nearby Roman legionary fortress of Isca Augusta (or Isca Silorum) in around 90AD. Interestingly, it was known in the Middle Ages as King Arthur's Round Table.   

We were headed for a different fort, however - the iron age hill fort that tops the wooded ridge overlooking the village. 

This involved a long and slightly tedious drag uphill ...  

... although there was some poetry - a passing glimpse of the Hanbury Arms, down by the River Usk, where Tennyson worked on his Idylls of the King, which is about King Arthur. (Are you sensing a theme?) ...

... and this sign in the window of a local primary school.

Then we were off tarmac and onto a muddy track and things started getting interesting. 

Lodge Wood hill fort was constructed some 300 to 500 years before the arrival of the Romans. 

The Silures - a fierce tribe, apparently - fought back against the Roman occupation, but were eventually either beaten or persuaded to work with them. 

When the Romans left in 400AD, many hillforts were reoccupied. During this period, King Arthur is said to have led the fightback against the Saxon invasion. In the 12th century, Geoffrey of Monmouth claims Caerleon is the site of Camelot. 

We didn't see the ghosts of any Roman centurions or courtly knights, but there was a funny feeling about the woods. As if the Pwca might live there.

The place will be full of bluebells shortly.

In the meantime, we got to admire the beautifully delicate and quite widespread wood anemones. 

The woods thinned as we left the area of the fort and views over Newport and the looping River Usk opened up. 

I kept Ted well away from this pond. 

We picked our way down a very slippery hillside to the road by Pwll-Mawr Farm. 

Our route should have taken us round the back of the hill over land described as marsh, and then up the steep and at times disappearing path through the woods. 

However, the ground was so already so wet  and treacherous that we decided to return to town on the new boardwalk alongside the river. 

Still, you know you've had a good walk when your boots look like this. 

Castles, Poets and the Usual Stuff

After all the half-timbered buildings in Stratford-Upon-Avon, it felt appropriate to continue the theme by going to Wales in Dru's Morris Traveller.

Having deposited Son the Elder in Newport for his Robot Wars sessions, we drove up the Usk valley to Llangybi, stopping first at the St Cybi's well which has A Literary Connection courtesy of T S Eliot, who wrote in his early poem, 'Usk':

'Do not suddenly break the branch, or

Hope to find

The white hart behind the white well.

Glance aside, not for lance, do not spell

Old enchantments. Let them sleep.

'Gently dip, but not too deep.'

Lift your eyes

Where the roads dip and the roads rise

Seek only there

Where the grey light meets the green air

The hermit's chapel, the pilgrim's prayer.'

This sounds a lot less mystical when you realise that the White Hart is a pub.  Unfortunately for the cash-strapped Dru and me, it's a gastro-pub so we had to make do with faggots and peas from the chip shop in Usk, but if you have a few spare coppers to rub together, it might well be worth trying, even if just for the channelling of the poet.   

Llangybi also has a lovely 13th/14th century church with mediaeval wall paintings and all.  See how the walls lean outwards? ... or is it me on the cider? ... no, they are definitely leaning.

This picture is a very rare type of wall painting depicting Christ with the tools of those who work on a Sunday in the process of wounding him.  Hmmm.  Begs the question, just how painful is a black Bic biro and a laptop?  

And this is the top of my favourite headstone in the churchyard.  It holds the bodies of Frederick Evans who died in 1831 aged 2, his father Evan Evans, died 1839 aged 59, and Sarah Evans, a widow until 1867, aged 82.  



'Long nights and days I bore great pain,
To waite for cure twas all in vain;
Till God above he thought it best
To take my pain and give me rest.'

After Llangybi Church but before the faggots and peas, Dru and I took the road less travelled by (probably because it is marked private) up to the castle, which is also known as Castle Tregrug.  En route we were joined by a black dog, which seemed fitting in this shadowy borderland, even if the dog in question was a Labrador with a red collar and a tag in the shape of a bone bearing a Newport postmark.  

Ted found the young whippersnapper a bit of a nuisance.  

The ruins were impressive, however.  I particularly liked the Tower House with its carved remains of fan vaulting amongst the ivy and umbellifers.    

Dru was able to tell me that what looks like an age-old holloway are, in fact, civil war fortifications.  

Having reunited the Labrador, who turned out to be called Sid, with his owners, we went three miles on up the valley to Usk. 

This is Ted waiting patiently for our dinner in the chip shop.

Usk is one of those towns that time forgot, apparently, and whilst not really being Tom Jones country, appropriating the title of one of his hits for the name of a shop selling undergarments doesn't feel like too much of a liberty (bodice).  

Usk Police Station.

'Hey, let's be careful out there!' 

While we ate our not very picnicky picnic we watched locals cooling off in the River Usk, non tidal here and not muddy.   Terrifyingly, some of them were jumping from the disused railway bridge into the not very deep water.  

Usk Castle is less hidden and neglected than Llangibby Castle, but it's still pretty far from being National Trustified.  

This is the view over the town with the Tithe Barn in the foreground.  Trelawney's Cedars to the right were grown from seeds brought back from the Protestant Cemetery in Rome, the last resting place of Keats' body and Shelley's ashes.  

The garden is sensitively maintained, with room for wild strawberries ... 

... and a fenced-off forest of Giant Hogweed.  

I liked the way the almost spent valerian seemed to flame from the walls under the hot sun.  

There was a service going on at Usk Church so we couldn't go in, though we did see the grave of the last Welsh martyr, St David Lewis, who was executed for being a Catholic priest in 1679 and buried in the churchyard.  

There was just time for a drink before picking up the Roboteer, so we stopped off at the Hanbury pub in Caerleon, again on the banks of the Usk, only to spot this plaque commemorating yet another poet, Alfred Lord Tennyson, who, like Eliot, was sufficiently inspired by the area to put pen to paper.  

'What have you two been up to?' asked Son the Elder, after our traditional post Robot Wars debriefing.  

'Oh, castles ... and poets ... and ... '

'The usual stuff then,' he interrupted.  

Well, quite.