Planning on riding Afan for the first time tomorrow so any tips welcome. Namely:
Is it all open and running ok with all the liquid sunshine we’ve been having lately?
Which centre to park at seeing as there seems to be 2 options?
Any trail recommendations for a days riding? I was thinking whites level am then the blade and a few bike park laps in the afternoon.
What’s the general consensus for how hard the riding is? Gf rides most stuff at trail centres but did struggle with some of the more rocky tech sections on the beast at coed y brenin. How do the red and black trails compare?

Hi Tom, I’ve not ridden blade recently but all the bits of w2 were open and running well last weekend. Both centres have the same facilities- parking, cafe, bike shop. The Afan one is nearer to M4, about 15 mins cycle to the glyncorrwg centre from there.
All decents should be fine for the gf if she rode CYB, exception being the black option to the left of Zigzags, that’s a bit hairy.

Brilliant thanks. Would W2 be a better option or would it be better to mix it up and try a couple of different trails to offer more thrills/mile

W2 is a good mixture of the best Afan has to offer.

It also incorporates the excellent cafe at Glyncorrwg and the half way around wooden shack cafe for a mid ride fuel top up.

Classic Afan ride.

Rode blade the other week all seemed to be open, really enjoyable trail, more technical at the end than the start sections but nothing too severe, my Mrs rode it all.

So can all trails be ridden from either centre?

Yep but with a bit of a pedal. It’s essentially 2 trail centres that meet in the middle.

Going back there in a little over a week, was well impressed with blade despite windfarm disruption and terrible diversion signage,hoping for an un-****ed lap this time!

For whatever it’s worth I really didn’t rate Penhydd at all, there’s some nice riding in it but I was just fed up of it by the end. We ended up going out after and doing Blue Scar and so glad we did, it’d have been a shame to leave afan on such a downer but the blue put a smile back on me.

We rode Blue Scar which was fun and good for a warm up and then we rode Penhydd which took a while to get going but had some nice sections towards the end.
We then drove over to the Glyncorrwg centre for lunch and a lap of the Blade trail. The first climb is pretty tough but so much fun and way preferable to a long boring fireroad climb. The trail had some really good sections of techy flowy trails along the way but we did think there were sections that just seemed a bit of a slog and you weren’t really gaining or losing much height so not massively rewarding. The final descent was epic though, so fast and so many brilliantly placed rock features and gulleys to keep it really interesting and definitely has a really alpine feel. So good in fact that we pushed up for another go despite being knackered.
The most surprising this was how quiet it was, only saw one guy on the trails the whole day!
Definitely will be going back. How do the other trails there compare?

Am I right to say there’s basically 2 parallel final descents? Blade’s one and, I dunno, Skyline’s? There seemed to be 2 trails coming down the hill but maybe I was seeing the climb or something.

From the top there are now two choices for the descent.

You can ride the Rock , which is the first part of the blade descent, and then just follow the Blade descent to the end.

Or, instead of taking the left turn to the Rock, carry on the trail.
This will take you down the classic Skyline descent.

I prefer the classic Skyline descent as it has a better flow.
The Blade descent is more technical,

That’s interesting to hear, when I got back and looked at the map I could see a little diversion along a fire road which missed out some of the not so interesting loop that heads you along the valet away from the trail centre and then back but kept most of the good parts. The gf found a few bit on the last descent a bit tough and had to walk a few bits so she might appreciate an alternative less technical option next time

Yes, on the return leg of the Blade route, you turn left into Groovy Gulley.
Grooves Gully is the twisting climbing piece of Singletrack.

This brings you to the very top of the climbing on the Blade.

You turn left along the ridge , which is a little rocky etc, but mainly flattish.

Not long after this, there is a fork in the trail.

Left is The Rock, carry on and this is the old Skyline descent.

Both descents end up on the Tarmac path at the bottom.

Nice one, cheers! I love that final blade descent but it’s good to have options.