Return to Kenfig Burrows

After my recent visit with Son the Younger to Rest Bay and Sker Point, my friend Liz Kerr remarked that she didn't know the South Wales coast that well, as previous visits across the bridge have generally involved visiting family in the Valleys, and so we arranged a second visit to the same spot, only starting at the Kenfig Nature Reserve, which has toilets and a van selling cups of tea, as befits our age and status. 

The appointed day dawned warm, cloudy but dry and it would have been a beautiful drive across the Vale of Glamorgan, but unfortunately we were talking too hard to notice it. Walking somewhere new is different, though - we had signposts to follow, leading us through the dunes to the coast. 

One of the first things I noticed was that there were far fewer flowers and insects than on my previous visit three weeks earlier, which is to be expected, of course. There were still some beauties, though. 

Hoverfly on perennial sow thistle 

Sorrel and yellow rattle pods, with clumps of great (or hairy) willowherb

Dewberries with the waxy bloom that gives them their name

Fleabane and wild mint

Loosestrife

After about a mile we reached Sker beach, where the chimneys of Port Talbot were belching. Our path then took us north along the coast for a short distance ... 

... before heading back inland. We took the opportunity to climb one of the higher dunes to get a better view of the burrows and surrounding landscape. 

Looking towards Port Talbot and Swansea

Hazy Somerset and Devon in the distance

Wild angelica with a six-spot burnet moth

Would you like some thyme with your carrots?

St John's Wort with added spider

Nursery web spider-type web and burnet rose hips

Gatekeeper on hemp agrimony

On the approach to Kenfig Pool we encountered patches of damp woodland and reeds that were noticeably cool and a little eerie. 

Kenfig Pool from the south hide

Back at the centre, we decided that rather than head straight for home, we'd visit Kenfig Castle, the topmost part of which is all that remains of the walled town of Kenfig, which was completely overwhelmed by sand in the 15th and 16th centuries. Google told us it was a mile's drive away in North Cornelly, so we set off. On the way we saw a stubby-looking fortified church - St Mary Magdalene, Kenfig - and decided to visit but the door was locked. There was a great view of Port Talbot from the churchyard, though. 

The Sat Nav then proceeded to take us down a long, terrifyingly narrow lane (thankfully there were no other drivers foolish enough to drive down it in the opposite direction), and we eventually ended up in the middle of an industrial estate. Google Maps was insisting this was where Kenfig Castle was, but no one in the reception of the nearest industrial unit had ever heard of it. We eventually decided we probably should have walked to it from the Nature reserve, which meant we'd have to return another day, and drove home laughing. Getting into silly scrapes for the last fifty-six years. That's us. 

Sker Point and Kenfig Burrows

True to form, it being the school holidays, I've driven 400 miles in the last two days. Most of these were in my capacity as Chauffeur to the Star, ie Son the Elder who is back doing some extra work for the first time since the pandemic started. (Can't reveal what the production is or who the big-name star is, obviously, except that even I've heard of him.)

The other sixty miles were with Son the Younger, who needed to get his car repaired in Newport, and who wanted to go on a jaunt to Porthcawl, rather than sit in Dunelm on Spytty Road for a whole day, waiting for it to be fixed, and since both jobs were in South Wales, it was easy to multitask.

The last time we were in Porthcawl, we'd walked along Merthyr Mawr beach to where the River Ogmore meets the sea, and we'd had my lovely old collie Ted with us, who'd had a great time running in and out of the waves even though it was February. We didn't bring our current collie, Cwtch, this time, even though she hails from nearby Neath, on account of it being 32 degrees in my car and far too hot. We decided to walk in the opposite direction too, in the hope that it would be less crowded than the beaches nearer town, so parked at Rest Bay and headed north-west along the coast towards Port Talbot.

Rest Bay with sea holly

Rock samphire

Sorrel

Pink Bay

The further we walked, the fewer people we encountered. It felt wild and bleak and lovely.

Cattle grazing on Sker Point

This is Sker House, the history of which goes back nearly a thousand years to when it was a grange belonging to nearby Margam Abbey, and which has attracted stories of persecuted Roman Catholic priests, and wreckers luring ships to their doom on the rocks of Sker Point.

A rock pool 

No idea whose feather this is

We walked some way along Sker beach and then decided that given the heat, we'd probably gone far enough. A little further ahead there were some naturists, and it was certainly hot enough and remote enough for the sighting not to be a surprise. As we sat and sweated, the skies cleared and the sun came out, burning away some of the mist that had shrouded the views of Port Talbot, Swansea and Gower. There was a bit of a breeze, just enough to make the heat bearable. 

On our way back, we walked along the edge of the dunes, which were thick with vegetation and wildlife. 

wild carrot

restharrow

wild thyme

sulphur beetles on carrot

There were multitudes of six-spot burnet moths, who, when they take off, become a blur of red wings - seen here on viper's-bugloss, spear thistle, wild mint and ragwort. Their wings had been bleached by the sun and the wind ... 

... the same conditions, I imagine, that has stunted the growth of this yarrow.

There are also some extraordinarily round pebbles.

Views from Sker Point 

By now we were tired and thirsty and glad to see Rest Bay on the horizon, although when we finally reached it, a brief glance in passing was all we had time for. Son the Younger needed to get back to the garage, and after I'd dropped him off, I had to dash back to Bristol for a few hours' respite before my midnight return to Wales to chauffeur home Son the Extra. Which is scant rest indeed.  

A Visit to the Summerlands

After Boxing Day's failed assault on Brent Knoll, an ad hoc return visit, this time more sensibly shod for the muddy conditions.

Brent Knoll must be a familiar landmark to anyone who's driven through Somerset on the M5, but it isn't immediately obvious from down below that the summit is an Iron Age hillfort,
   

with multiple ramparts following the contours of the hill.

It was also once the site of a Roman Temple.  

But the best bit are the views, today marred by a nasty yellow stain of smog.  I've done a bit of googling and apparently it's quite a common occurence over the Channel during periods of calm weather, the consensus being that it drifts over from the works at Port Talbot.

Anyway, here we are looking over to Steepholm and Brean Down ... 

... Crook Peak ... 

... Cheddar Reservoir and the Mendips ... 

... a new inland sea between Brent Knoll and Glastonbury Tor ...

... the mouth of the River Parrett and the Quantocks ...

... and down to Hinkley Point (boo) ... 

Look, here's those floods again. (Evidence of recent, not such calm weather.)  No hint of the misery of flooded homes from this distance; just the Summerlands remembering themselves.  

  

As we descended the Knoll, the half moon soared ... 

... and the last of the sun lit last summer's seed heads ... 

... and this winter's ivy.