[Closed] South Wales Tomorrow

Head for the hills. The ground conditions are finally conducive to a proper ride. Leave the trail centres for when it is too wet to ride natural!

In short the top loop of Cafall is closed and the middle climb of Twrch.

BUT...

You might only have time for one... unless you follow my patented 'got to get back or the wife will kill me' route.

Carpark up the climb as normal until the Ranger Station - at that point there are four options uphill in front of you - left to right they're cafal climb / fireroad / twrch climb (closed) and forrest drive (where Twrch is diverted at the moment)

Take 'fireroad' - follow for a K or two, at the first fork, turn left (it's almost a 180 degree turn) - after about another K you'll get to Quadzilla which is the start of the diversion, follow that diversion and pick up the rest of Cafal, ride as normal - towards the end of the trail you'll get back to the forest drive (can't miss it, it's the only tarmac road you'll cross - big black metal wheel thing up hill from you, bit of a carpark) instead of carrying over the road to the end - turn left uphill - now you're on forest drive - follow it back to the ranger station and up the hill to follow the Twrch trail.

You basically skip the first climb of Cafal which is steep and nasty to favour of a easier, but longer fire road - it cuts a decent amount of time off for me - you haven't missed much.

The final section of Cafal is fairly weak, it's not worth it only to climb back up again was Twrch and saves a pile more time.

Twrch is diverted that way anyway, but I usually take the road up, again you skip a technical climb and save a pile more time.

It's just under 20k,  800m of climbing (when Cafal isn't diverted) and take me about 2 hours (moving time) it's all the good descents in the shortest time possible.

@P-Jay, thanks for the reply, great description. I`ll see how I go tomorrow, I like a technical climb so to miss them all out seems a shame.

Really? Sadist 😉 have a good one.

P-Jays route makes a lot of sense. I almost did that last week but ended up doing the finishing sections of Caf because K-Jam is my jam. Doing full laps of both this way took me ~2hr20 moving time, but I was with a friend who slowed me a little.

The only caveat I'd give to the fireroad climb is that a friend went up there ~10 days ago and said it was covered in bark/offcuts etc from the felling activity which ****ed up his front tyre. Maybe someone has been more recently and could update? I know you said you'd prefer the tech climb (Me too!) but more info can't hurt, eh?

Other suggestions are bang on though, its the first time for a while it's dry enough to consider going somewhere other than a Trail Centre so I'd probably do that. Without being too specific, just go one roundabout further down the valley and you'll have a good time. (PM me if this is too cryptic and you want details.)

Hope OP had a good time - I actually decided to ride my own route this morning - sweet as a nut, don’t remember the last time Cafal was so ‘dry’.

Couldn’t feel my hands till past the ranger station!

’Fireroad’ was completely clear, didn’t look like they’d been working over there - Forest Drive has been swept, it was impassable a few weeks back.

Cwmcarn is pretty mint at the moment - the 2 man volunteer trail crew do great work - there’s no a puddle anywhere and they swept the whole of Twrch recently, makes the trail seem a bit wider and gives you a bit more line choice.

Cafall was really good about a week ago when I was at CwmCarn. The descent along Heartbreak ridge and Riddler transported me back about 27 years to when I used to ride the, ahem, cheeky trails around Rudry valley, Draethen and Ruperra on my beloved Spesh Hardrock....sigh.

Ace tip for that route, think I’ll do it next time I visit. I always mean to do both loops but once I see the car that goes out the window so this way may win!