Afan Argoed – Best trail?

Hey there,

I’m visiting Afan tomorrow for the first time and I’m a bit bewildered by the sheer number of trails there.

Does anyone have any favourites they could recommend? Looking for about 20 km – 3 hours of riding. Not super technical (no dh black trails please) as I’ll be on my lonesome and the wife’ll kill me if I tw4t myself before heading to the rugby on Sunday.

Cheers.

If you do Y Wal (The Wall) from the Afan visitor centre – 23km, takes us 1.5 – 2 hours depending on how long we stop for – you can do Penhydd after if you feel like it, from the same start point, 14 km I think.

Y Wal has a free ride area at the top for some extra variety – bermy runs, table tops, etc – to play around on too, if you want to get more value out of the one trail.

Just back. Too hot climbing in full sun yesterday!

W2 was incredible (The Wall & Whites Level) 4hrs riding with lunch at the other visitor centre in the middle. The Whites Level climb after lunch; that’ll burn some calories off.

But if you’ve not enough time then yes, The Wall & Penhydd.

Blade is around 24k

I prefer the Glyncorrwg center to the Afan center (it’s a bit further up the valley)

Whites Level is about 17 km long and is a great trail.

Blade is 24km long and has a bit of everything.

They both share the same Whites Climb out of the center which is a much better climb than either the Wall of Penhydd.

Cheers for the advice.

I’d be off for a lap of Blade if I were you.

They all look ok on the map! Blade, White’s Level and the Wall were what I was thinking about as options. In terms of technical, how do they compare to Scottish trail centre trails like Kirroughtree and the Glentress black? Both of those are well inside my comfort zone but wouldn’t want to go much beyond them when on my own somewhere I don’t know.

Nothing too technical at all, it can all be ridden with your wheels on the ground.

For a 3 hour ride I would do W2 starting from Afan as that normally takes me around 3 hours. When you have finished you have the option to do Penhydd (about an hour), or even Blue Scar (30mins) which is smooth, but good fun.

I think the wall is my favourite, it’s bedded in and feels largely natural. Blade is much more artificial feeling, I don’t like it as much, but if big swoopy berms are your thing you might. Ages since I rode whites. You could happily do the wall and penhydd in three hours, could probably do whites and blade too. Or as suggested w2.

Fwiw you won’t be on your own! Sunny Saturday, there will be plenty of folk around. I understand the sentiment, but if you did get into trouble I’d imagine someone would pass by fairly rapidly

Ta for the updated info. I must àdmit, I really am not a swoopy berm fan. The wall might be the ticket.

Ta for the updated info. I must àdmit, I really am not a swoopy berm fan. The wall might be the ticket.

Don’t do Penhydd then!

Posters quoting 3 hours for W2 and 1.5 for Wall, is that ‘real time’ or Strava time with auto-pause? 15kph average speed is very quick for that sort of terrain and there’s a Wife’s mood at stake here!

Anyway, I’d vote for Blade, there are some swoopy bits, but it’s very varied and has a great final descent.

Posters quoting 3 hours for W2 and 1.5 for Wall, is that ‘real time’ or Strava time with auto-pause? 15kph average speed is very quick for that sort of terrain and there’s a Wife’s mood at stake here!

Those times are doable, but would be more or less in the top 10% strava times. Add 30 mins to the Wall and 1 hour for W2. that’s not hanging around either.

All the trails up the masts 😉

As always it depends on how quick you are. I based those times on a ride I did there with my wife last Saturday. We did Pynhydd, W2 and Blue Scar in 4hr39min moving time and 5hr30min total time (stopped for Welsh Rarebit at Glyncorrwg) If you rest/chat at the end of each section then it will take a bit longer.

If you find W2 takes too long you can always short cut at halfway and take the cycle path from Glyncorrwg back to Afan.

Erm…there are about 3-4 berms on the whole of Blade, and they aren’t even that smooth! It’s “chunkier” than the wall and whites, I do get why people might not like it, but smooth and new school it ain’t!

Depends what you’re into. Blade is a marmite trail. Some don’t like it because there’s extra climbing involved beyond Whites. Myself I was dubious from bad reports of it, but first go loved it. People moaned about short down then climb, etc but I found the descents were plenty long enough and flowing to be fun and final descent is mad.

Whites of course is a classic. A shame the original descent is now treeless. The Rowan smooth descent option is a bit meh, stick to the original.

Y Wall is ok. Penhydd is not what it was but combine with Y Wall it’s not bad.

Last time there did Whites climb, Blade, then down the old railway path to Y Wall, part of that and W2 link to end of Whites and finish. Nice loop. Could also chuck in Penhydd if time.

I must admit, after just having got back from a 3 hour bimble round the Blade, I can see why it is Marmite. It is sitting in my bottom two trail centre trails.

There’s nothing at all technical on it, but … by god does the surface not hammer you?

The climb was long but easily rideable (if slowly by me) but it took a long time to get any decent descent time. A lot of the descents seemed to be over almost as soon as they had begun.

Apart from that, I kind of got the feeling they tried to squeeze as much rocky armoured trail in as they could. Up to the end, there was hardly any “take a break” trail time.

Natural rides definitely have wee gaps to rest the mind and body while you pedal and the best trail centres have the same. Not here though.

My biggest bug bear though, what the heck is it with all the little gates at the entry and exit of anything interesting? Too narrow for riding through for me. Blinking annoying to have to stop and lift your bike through them. Grrr.

First trail centre trail in a long time that didn’t leave a grin on my face. Pity.

You rode the wrong trail. Of all the trails at Afan, blade is the worst. Too much ascent not enough descent or flow. Not fun. Either W2 for a good 5 hour ride or y wal for a couple of hours. Y wal and whites are the best trails I’ve ridden anywhere.

Re: the gates, unfortunately they’re needed to keep MX riders out.

All I can say to peter1979 is stay away from cafell at cwmcarn. If you thought blade had little reward, this trail WILL piss you right off! One of the worst I’ve ridden anywhere!

Sorry for the thread hijack but can someone confirm if the visitor centre at Afan is still open or not as I’m planning to go there tomorrow – can’t recall how it all panned out and a quick search hasn’t revealed anything.

The cafe was open last weekend.

Everything at Afan is open as normal. They’re talking to 2-3 people who are keen to run it as a commercial venture.

Correction the ticket machine in the car park is still broken.

Thanks guys for the response

wrecker – Member
All I can say to peter1979 is stay away from cafell at cwmcarn. If you thought blade had little reward, this trail WILL piss you right off! One of the worst I’ve ridden anywhere!

Raven at Brechfa is worse. Good god, one section actually descends for a while on a bloody fireroad! Singletrack mostly lasts 10 seconds and oh, over already, dull climb. End was okay, but everything leading up to it pissed me off. That’s even considering I’ve got the fitness to not be too fussed with climbs these days.

I’ve ridden the raven, and it’s better than cafell!

Cafell is my favourite S. Wales trail centre loop. Climbs are as much a part of mtb’ing as the downs IMHO, good job there’s a choice so whatever rocks your boat.

Strangely, even though I dislike blade I quite like cafall. It has a big ascent, but the final descent is good fun, plus there’s a good section in the middle half way up the main ascent

DIdn’t like blade first time I rode it. Rode it four times now (last one being a couple of weeks ago) and every time I like it a bit more. Last descent reminds me of riding in the Ardeche. Does feel like lots of climbing tho.

W2 is my fav. Followed by Blade and Whytes (although with all necessary tree felling, dark side isn’t as good as it used to be). Penhydd is a bit meh. Loved the old one.

Rode Cafell yesterday for fourth time I think. Hated that one first time as well but it had just opened and was really boggy and draggy esp in the woods. Lovely and dry up there now. Climb is tough but some cracking descents.

Beware tho, nearly all of twrch is closed. You can use the push up track to ride the last descent (we did doesn’t look like many others are) but the rest is inaccessible unless you fancy a 3 mile road ride. Old DH is mostly closed, new DH totally closed and even the singletrack to the start of the forest road (where you pay) isn’t open after the first climb.

We asked when it’d all be open again, but no date set. Obviously it takes a long time to fell all the larch trees. very sad.

To get the most out of Afan you have to know how to link the good bits together. Start with the Masts then cycle path and upto Windy Point/Engery over to the top to the Y Wal, Skills Park and S4 down. 🙂

please dont start telling the tourists about the masts and the like, the last thing we need is people breaking themselves on the unmarked trails and the powers that be getting twitchy and flattening them all.

The unofficial stuff has been well know for ages,thanks to Strava mainly. Chill. Plus they are too techy for most of “the tourists ” to bother with.

b45her – Member
please dont start telling the tourists about the masts and the like, the last thing we need is people breaking themselves on the unmarked trails and the powers that be getting twitchy and flattening them all.

There is this now doing guided off piste. Not sure if they do the stuff you’re talking about, but still – http://www.afanvalleybikeshed.co.uk/Afan-Off-Piste

Beware tho, nearly all of twrch is closed. You can use the push up track to ride the last descent (we did doesn’t look like many others are) but the rest is inaccessible unless you fancy a 3 mile road ride. Old DH is mostly closed, new DH totally closed and even the singletrack to the start of the forest road (where you pay) isn’t open after the first climb.

We asked when it’d all be open again, but no date set. Obviously it takes a long time to fell all the larch trees. very sad.

Sadly I think Cwmdown is likely to go under and the DH stuff with it. BPW half killed the place as it is after numbers dropped and they had to let a driver go with just one bus remaining.

I’m surprised and really happy Cwmdown has managed to adjust to BPW opening up the road, it would be a crying shame if they went, BPW owes a lot to Cwmdown, for a long time there was little to no full time uplifts running.

I personally don’t think they do them many favours though, I was disappointed to read that Cognation delayed and almost cancelled the new DH track on the grounds that “it wasn’t needed”. The new DH track isn’t widely liked and the uplift road is appalling and had to be opened, closed, opened, closed etc.

I’d hate to think it, but in a more cut throat industry it would be unthinkable to let BackOnTrack be responsible for building the road and track at Cwmcarn when they also run BPW, thier closest competitors.

Just got back from a weekend at Afan. We did Blade, Whites, Wall and Penhydd.

Blade was the least favourite by some distance. Whites and Wall were superb. Penhydd was a lot better than expected.

If you like penhydd, you won’t like Blade; completely different trails for completely different riders!

Whites with black run, wall, blade then penhydd/blue scar. In that order imo.

I find it funny Afan Off Piste mostly uses trails outside of Afan Valley.