Martin McDowell's Blog

This is marked as the toughest walk in the Brecon Becons & South Wales book and it turned out to be living up to its name. The most difficult part was trying to not get lost on Bryn Rhudd at the same time as not loosing interest in the walk as well. The views on [...]

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Here are just some of the best photos from the trip. Wales (mid and north) 2010 Gigrin Farm red kite feeding centre in Rhayader Stunning view of the Elan valley Craig Goch Craig Goch Penygarreg reservoir Claerwen reservoir Claerwen reservoir View from the dam at Claerwen reservoir (a red kite nest is in the trees [...]

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Today I was here. Took me a while to get here and find it. Had to give up the whole trek round the mountain ridges as I was going to run out of daylight by the end of the hike. Llyn y Fan Fach  

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The Sunday between Christmas and the New Year I spent hiking around Pembrokeshire and this time I went for walk no. 12 (Around Ynys Barry) taken from the book mentioned in some of my previous posts There is a local attraction called the Blue Lagoon that is just a few minutes away from the Aber Eiddy [...]

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Had a big snowstorm last night that covered Pembrokeshire with a bit of snow. These photos taken from a hike up to the highest peak in the Preseli hills – Foel Cwmcerwyn. Very windy at the top! Pembrokeshire snow 2010 Near Foel Cwmcerwyn Near Foel Cwmcerwyn Near Foel Cwmcerwyn Foel Feddau, looking towards Newport (Carn [...]

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After all the worries about traveling from Haverfordwest to Stansted the 5 1/2 hour trip went fine. Blue skies in most of the Wales part, the first snow on the M4 spotted about 6 miles west of the exit for Slough. The roads are gritted and the only delay was on the M4 exit for [...]

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Not feeling very well in the morning of the last day, this cold has been getting the better of me and running around London does not help it getting any better. Drugging-up with anti-inflammatories not helped either. First port of call was the London eye I booked the previous day on-line. Looks amazing when standing [...]

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I started the day a bit more relaxing by taking a slow breakfast at the local Starbucks at London Bridge station opposite Guy’s Hospital. A friend told me I had to try the frappucino and their panninis. The guy at the counter asked me twice if I was sure about the frappucino? It is apparently [...]

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After only sleeping a few hours as I only went to bed at 4 am as a consequence from the previous night’s walkabout London I had a Fat Tyre bike tour planned for the Saturday morning. The tour takes place on bicycles you get from the tour company and it starts at 11am just outside [...]

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I soon realised my satnav is going to make me drive down the M4 right into the centre of London – no ifs or butts. Wasn’t that bad really, all I had to do is to imagine I was driving downtown Ljubljana – just on a much bigger scale. And it really went very well [...]

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Recently I haven not been writing about my treks round Pembrokeshire and how I have been working my way through the “Walking in Pembrokeshire” guide. I’ve done so many now I have been repeating some of them two to three times. This last walk I did for the first time and is worth mentioning as [...]

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Včeraj sem šel spet malo na ogled do lokacije snemanja novega filma o Robinu Hoodu na obali Freshwater West in zadeve so se precej spremenile od prejšnjega tedna, ko sem bil nazadnje tam. Varnostnikov ni bilo veliko in tokrat so me vsaj spustili na plažo, kljub temu, da je na tam potekalo snemanje. Povsod sami [...]

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V mesecu juniju 2009 so pričeli nedaleč od tod s snemanjem naslednje filmske upodobitve princa tatov – Robina Hooda. Lokacija, kjer poteka snemanje, se imenuje Freshwater West in gre za eno lepših plaž v Pembrokeshire-ju in Wales-u nasploh. Tu so pejšnji mesec celo snemali naslednji film o Harryu Potterju. Produkcija za Robina Hooda pa je [...]

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Ever since I moved to Wales 2 years ago I had a quiet wish to climb the highest peak in this country – Snowdon. Last weekend was showing to be a perfect opportunity to fulfil that wish. I was working only till 12 pm and the forecast was for sunshine and high temperatures stretching way [...]

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I am convinced you everyone will see the huge difference in the views you see on the north side of the peninsula, compared to the south – while on the north side you see the beautiful town of Angle, but then as you move further along you are met with the view of all the [...]

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This one the walk no 27 taken from the book and is a bit of a deviation from the books theme – it being that there are 41 circular walks in Pembrokeshire. Well this walk is still in Pembrokeshire but it is not at all circular. However the authors can be forgiven for this as [...]

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This was the longest of the walks in the book and a walk not to be reckoned with. It is long and by the end you just really want to see that lighthouse in the distance. The authors say in the beginning of the walk »Although the longest of the walks in this book, there [...]

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What a thoroughly enjoyable way to spend a March Sunday. In fact it was so nice I wish the hike would have lasted a bit longer. Instead I took the opportunity to sit and enjoy the sunshine on the wooden bench by the Sychbant car park were this walk starts and ends. The walk (no. [...]

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As the book states this is a walk where you can see lots of nice views and hardly meet anyone. And it was true for me. Only people I met were some farmers on a field, however the fact that I did the walk on a Tuesday afternoon might have had something to do with [...]

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Nice contrast from the Rosebush walk I took yesterday. This walk is no 40 called Pentre Evan Nature Reserve and I just a great forest walk with some hill climbing thrown in as well. This was also the walk that was the most confusing as the instructions in the book did  not help in many [...]

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