Llanfoist - Sunday 11th March 2012

Very unusual walk, this.  Just R (M at Ilse's hut), on a beautiful sunny March day.  The first half was so boring, flat and featureless that I wish I hadn't bothered.  Then, on leaving the canal and hitting the fields, there was the most STONKING climb of all time.  It just went on. Plus the first part of the climb was through a big field of sheep with their new-born lambs who thought I had some kind of christening present for them...

I have rarely been so shattered on a walk, but the second half was very picturesque.

 The old Govilon Station (apparently pronounced 'Given')

Part of the walk from the Railway Path down to the Canal.  Pretty.

 Looking both ways up and down a very featureless towpath.... on a previous unsuccessful attempt to do this walk a few years ago, this whole section was closed for towpath replacement.  The result is this bland motorway.

 View from point 'H' on the walk, I was hanging!  The mountain is Ysgyryd Fawr (pronounced 'Big 'ill).

Approaching the extraordinary 'Punchbowl'.  It's a glacial hollow, and strolling up to it in the middle of Blorenge is a surreal experience.