Black Mountains trip report

Bank Holiday weekend and on the Sunday a weather forecast to get enthused about for a late afternoon excursion to the northern escarpment of the Black Mountains. The Black Mountains escarpment is part of the Great Red Edge that runs across the Brecon Beacons National Park, so named due to the underlying Old Red Sandstone bedrock. The Black Mountains have undergone repeated exposure to the action of glacial ice and periglacial processes, yet the plateau areas show little apparent sign of glaciation. Surprisingly, comparatively little research has been published on elucidating the evolution of the Black Mountains landscape. The Black Mountains also held some importance for ancient people, as a number of funerary monuments were built in the adjacent landscape. From some viewpoints on the escarpment a number of Neolithic chambered tombs sited at lower elevations can be viewed and Bronze age cairns also occupy some prominent positions at higher elevations. The reason for the siting of the Neolithic funerary monuments locations remains an enigma.

The plan was to walk along the escarpment, with stops to take in the views and to photograph the expansive views as shower light flitted across the landscape, before looping back over moorland and deciding on where to linger for sunset.
The weather was warm and the ascent made in full sunshine, which made matters unpleasant. When the hill slope eased, unerringly, cloud rolled in and that was the last of the sun for the next couple of hours walking. Stops were made to take in the views from the escarpment, the camera gear was not required. A notable highlight was watching a Kestrel demonstrate its mastery of the wind to quarter the escarpment ridge, at times it hovered a matter of metres away, too close for the binoculars field of view. It was surprisingly warm, even with the absence of sunshine and with a stiff breeze at ~750m ASL, a base layer was sufficient.

A brighter area of sky on the western horizon provided some cause for photographic optimism. However the elevated views were marred by reduced visibility, I guess due to a moisture associated with the low level overhead cloud, whilst lower down below 600m the visibility was good. The air clarity determined where a location for sunset would be and a descent made to an outcrop of bedrock with views.
The nature of the vertical joints/fractures in the bedrock outcrop, appeared to correlate with the orientation of the ridge. It would not be unreasonable to suggest that the geological structure exerted some control on the evolution of the landscape.

The sun did sink into the letterbox of clear sky on the horizon and with overhead cloud, the quality of the resulting light was very good.

Needless to say it was a good trip.

A dawn trip to the Brecon Fans

The Met Office served up a reasonable forecast and a trip implemented.

The ticket machine at the National Trust Cwm Gwdi car park provided a time check of 04.04 hrs, surprisingly I had not dithered and no delays on the journey, meant I was well ahead of schedule. Which was just as well as I managed to miss the feint path I needed to take in the valley wood and continued instead on a more easier to follow trail into the bracken clad lower slopes. Recent high winds had flattened the bracken, obscuring trails and resulting in me thrashing my way through it, until reaching the open hillside. The small consolation of the steepness of the hillslope meant I witnessed several shooting stars, aided by the fact that there was no cloud.

Aside from contrails an almost cloudless sky.

The lack of cloud was disconcerting, the prospect of clear skies and cool blue shadows is not an appealing one. A record shot was made of the absence of cloud over much of mid Wales, to be fair there appeared to be a bank of cloud over the distant eastern horizon, which meant the quality first light would be compromised.

Things panned out pretty much as anticipated, the predawn twilight resulted in some wispy cloud and contrails turning pink, the quality first light went missing in the cloud on the eastern horizon and some warm light provided some relief for an image of the heather moorland with contrails some relief against an uninspiring sky. Sigh.

A wander ensued and a nice scene was found of a Rowan tree surviving against the odds of sheep grazing and storms, with the Brecon Fans as a backdrop and some potential for a future trip. Then it was back to the car, reflect on the importance of a sky for a landscape photograph and not for the first time reflect on how inaccurate Met Office forecasts are for dawn.

Elenydd trip report

An afternoon trip to mid Wales and the Elenydd. It was evident during the journey that extensive cloud cover determined that a walk in the Oak woods would be more productive than up on the hills. I was also curious to see how an area of woodland designated as Special Area of Conservation was being managed.

A wander along a stream led to a waterfall, where the combination of inclined cleavage, bedding planes and joints in the bedrock, contributed to a staircase of waterfalls. I thought this would have some potential later in the year with autumnal foliage and higher water flows.

It was heartening to see that the oak woods were naturally regenerating with oak, birch, holly and rowan trees in the form of saplings and seedlings. No plastic tubes were evident, so reduced levels of herbivore grazing were most likely the trigger for regeneration.

The woodland management also extended to leaving standing and fallen deadwood, increasing the biodiversity and rebalancing the woodlands naturalness. The trip was a good one, some stuff to ponder and to a laymans eyes the woodland was recovering.

A hill walking learning curve

A friend is testing the waters with hill walking and I have taken him out on a couple of walks into the nearby hills, walks away from the popular summits and into less visited areas. It has been an insightful exercise watching someone on a learning curve. He has now cut his toenails and realises the virtues of a walking pole. The most recent trip saw him experience the reality of a Met Office Mountain Weather forecast and some weather. The weather was gale force gusts, squalls and extended periods of rain, interspersed with some dryer spells and some brief intermittent spells of sunshine. He was genuinely surprised at how quickly weather deteriorates over the hills and the first time he had looked down onto a rainbow in the valley below. Sadly the rainbow was not luminous enough to attempt photographing.

The walk was a circuit around one of Wales less visited and written about landslides in the Black Mountains. There is much of geomorphological interest and the escarpment is also one of the locations where Llanthony Valley Whitebeam grows. It was a good hill walking trip and loitering at one viewpoint between showers was rewarded with a break in the cloud and some sunlight to illuminate the scenery.