So me and ChrisL are off to South Wales- staying in Cymmer, right by Afan forest. I know precisely nowt about south wales riding, never been, Chris knows it better… We have 4 days spare, basically. So, what to ride?

We’ve booked a day at BPW. I’m maybe booking an uplift at FOD as well (we’re coming via Tewkesbury so it’s on the way). So probably no more uplifts. Any natural routes need to be piss-easy to navigate as we are basically incompetent, we default to red and black trailcentres usually but it doesn’t have to be… The Gap in the Beacons comes up often?

I suppose we’re looking for red/black trailcentry stuff really but a bit of variety too. Any advice much appreciated!

4 days?

Cwmcarn, both xc loops plus a run of the DH

FOD

BPW

Afan W2

Sorted

4 days eh?

Give 1 up to BPW.

Make the trip to Brechfa, that’s another. Red is best IMO.

Afan is a must if you’re already there – pick a trail that fits the distance you want to do – 4 days on the trot, you might not want to do 50km.

Cwmcarn is a bit ‘closed’ at the moment, well the original half it anyway. Cafall is good, DH if you’re brave and good.

There are hundreds, if not thousands of KMs worth of natural trails, man-made unofficial trails and stuff that straddles both camps in South Wales, and I’m sure one of the anti-trail centre guys will be along shortly “there’s more to wales than centres!!!11!” but they’re not always easy to find and harder to follow. It’s up to you, but if you spend a day lost in the woods knee deep in crap – well, it’s all part of the rich tapestry of life.

Either way, you’ll get home happy, but weeping at the idea of stairs.

Had a long weekend down that way just last weekend with the Amptill mob – BPW Thursday, Afan Friday ( there’s plenty there to keep you entertained), “gentle” pootle round the Gower on Saturday (I missed that, had to come home for a stag do 🙁 ), big night out Saturday and you get a day of rest to recover. Cushty, great way to spend a weekend. 🙂

4 days + the day already booked at BPW, I should have said!

But you basically hit the nail on the head, at home I’m certainly not just a trailcentre guy but I don’t mind spending a day pissing about getting lost, exploring dead ends etc at home, don’t want to do that on holiday especially when there’s good, accessible stuff I’ve never even seen. So it’s not anti-natural-trails or anything but just use of time

blaengarw is just over the hill from Afan and is probly the most overlooked purpose-built place in the land 🙂 Its **** great fun; blue is piece of piss climb followed by fun, swoopy descent – can genuinely be done in 10 mins, black is significantly more difficult and possibly the most technical trail centre descent after laggan.

You’re right Rob, Blaengarw is a great little circuit – the rock garden on the black is great fun (the black climb is tough going though!)

Brechfa is definitely worth a trip – it will be a full day to get over there, ride and back. You could also fit in a few laps of Cwm Rhaeadr while you are over in the West.

Blade is great – there is a bit of everything on that trail and White’s Level is also a must do.

If your going to Cwmcarn for the day I would do Cafell in the morning and Twrch in the afternoon. Cafell is the longer of the two especially as Twrch has quite a large diversion. If you want to shortcut some of the diversion on the Twrch you can do so by climbing on foot the steep hill after the gate on the fire road. Its a calf buster but should only take 5 minutes. It takes you to the top of the descents.

Definitely do the Gap ride if you haven’t done it already. It’s a proper big country type ride. There’s loads of gpx type files out there for it. Depending on when your down I could guide you round, I’m sure plenty if others on here would as well.

Breachfa red and Cwm Rhadear
FOD on the bus but guided to the best bits. (When you going? I might be about)
Afan Blade trail or mix Ywal/Blade and whites level (guided)
Bikepark Wales
Cwmcarn Cafell trail on the way home.

Worth considering The Black Mountains killer loop too.
Like The Gap but biggerer and betterer.

Uplift at black mountains should be on your list, they do day or evening lifts on certain nights.
Cafell at Cwm carn is a great trail.
Blade, whites level and the wall are all really good at Afan.
Smilog woods in llantrisant, not sign posted but if you venture up the forest road climb you’ll bump into the trails.
Mountain ash Dh is about 15 mins drive from bpw.

I get the feeling Cwm rhaedr may be closed for a few months for forestry work. Abergorlech trail at Brechfa is worth a visit..

Little tip from a local here. At the start of zig zag (last section of y wal) there’s a red barrier to your left. Beyond that barrier is stage 4 of last years Gravity Enduro, that section is very steep and very natural. Well worth a look if you’re there.

For reference, we plan to be at FoD this Sunday, and BPW on Wednesday next week. That leaves us with Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and possibly Friday (though we’ll probably be riding further north that day) to ride elsewhere.

Northwind is far more DH-capable than I am.

You can ride all te trails in afan in a day and a half or so, so i’d be tempted to do Afan Monday and Thurs and natural on weds. COuld ride penhydd and the wall on monday am. head up to do whites level in the arvo. Ride blade thurs am and then go and mess around in the skills park in the arvo (Blade is a work out so good to have a chill in the arvo before bpw.

Natural stuff loads of options. depends how far you want to drive.

The thread title is missing an ‘i’.

Afan masts. From cymmer you can ride there easy.

Whites if you only do one trail at Afan (with black run).

Id be hitting Blaengarw on the way down for a quick hour spin, great fun. Or Cafall.

Load of local stuff, smilog, castel coch/garth/tyn-y-coed, wyllie, machen, rudry, mountain ash….

Black mountains, Cwmcarn and BPW for uplifts

When are you going? Im happy to get you some routes or even show you round something.

philwarren11 – Member
When are you going?

ChrisL – Member
For reference, we plan to be at FoD this Sunday, and BPW on Wednesday next week.

🙂

If you want to experience the very best that South Wales has to offer, and you like a bit of winch and plummet, get a local to show you around Machen or Pontypool. I’d offer, but I’m not around next week.

Machen is quite well known now, Pontypool less so. Both incredible imo.

It’ll also stop you from getting all trail-centred out.

Brechfa Gorlech trail, Cwm Rheaeder just up the road, Doethie valley for some spectacular natural riding. Coed Trallwm just up the road again ( where they hold rounds of the welsh enduro series) and a bit further north is Nant y Arian, where there is the committing reaper trail. Loads of riding in a pretty small geographical area! – you also get the see the best parts of Wales.

I’d skip cwmcarn. The twrch is mostly closed and cafall isn’t great.
Do W2 and have a mess and chill on the “bike park” on day one. uplift day at BPW day 2 (excellent since they’ve sorted the uplift system). Blade and Blaengarw day 3. Maybe FOD uplift day on the last day on the way back.
Brechfa is OK, but it’s still a fair way to travel for a trail.

Thanks very much guys! I think mostly it’s reinforcement of what we already thought but that’s actually ideal, tells me we’re on the right track. And thanks for offers of guiding, I think we’ll keep it simpler for this trip as it’s ended up a bit last minute but I appreciate it.

(especially thanks for advice on Cwmcarn, it was on my list but I didn’t realise it had closures. And Blaengarw, now to convince Chris he wants to ride it… )

If you are in the area for that long I really would recommend at least one natural ride. Black Mountains killer loop is a good pick I reckon.

As for getting lost on it you would be able to get a gpx of that route and follow it on a phone.

And Blaengarw, now to convince Chris he wants to ride it… )

He might not be thanking you after the climb! (at least it’s over with quickly) If he enjoys a good proper descent, he’ll love it.

Yea get a loop of the off piste stuff in whilst in Afan, probably the best trails in Wales, if you like it steep and dangerous that is! I’m 10 mins away from Afan, don’t mind showing you around on the Monday if you’d like.

rob8624 – Member
Yea get a loop of the off piste stuff in whilst in Afan, probably the best trails in Wales, if you like it steep and dangerous that is! I’m 10 mins away from Afan, don’t mind showing you around on the Monday if you’d like.

Now maybe some of you know that Northwind is quite into Enduros and things like that. I am however a cowering mincer. He has to put quite a lot of effort into persuading me to ride new and challenging trails. Rule number 1 in how he does that is to not introduce them as “steep and dangerous”… 😯

Nothing to add 😆

Is this:
http://www.gpsies.com/map.do?fileId=kdtelxubjpmdgfwq&language=en
The black mountains killer loop mentioned?

cafall isn’t great

Disagree. I like it much more than W2.

Nothing to add

Is this:
http://www.gpsies.com/map.do?fileId=kdtelxubjpmdgfwq&language=en
The black mountains killer loop mentioned?

yep that’s the one

OK thanks all, safe back! We got messed up with the weather and mechanicals a bit so ended up not being able to pick up a bunch of the suggestions but they were really helpful…

We could ride to the Afan trails from our cottage so spent most of the time there. Absolutely loved Blade in the rain, one of the best trailcentre laps I’ve done I think- felt pretty haggard in places but that added to it for me, full of personality, great climb up from the valley, class descent… Mint. BPW was fantastic too, broke my wheel there so lost a couple of runs but got all the reds and most of the unjumpy blacks done. Really want to get back to both of those. FOD was really good too, I squeezed in a lap of the red and blue, tons crammed intot hose for the fairly short length… Took a while to figure out the uplift routes though, pretty confusing I thought but some great riding.

Oh and how good is that skills area at CYB?

(the signposting on the windfarm diversions on Blade is shit, btw! Plus “helpful” windfarm workers who diverted me down some random path onto skyline’s return leg. Not too impressed at all that but didn’t spoil the day)

Can’t wait to get back now! Will need to try and tick off more of these suggestions next time and maybe take a bigger bike to BPW

Oh and how good is that skills area at CYB?

I particularly like the way it features “features” to practice on before doing the trails – that don’t appear on any of the trails

Reminds me, I need to ride blade again soon.

@Rob, I like how the black loop in the foundry is comically harder than the actual black trails 😆 Really does make Glentress’s skills loop look shit though in comparison

(if you go to Nevis Range, their test/skills loops were built before the red uplift was built- so it says “If you can ride this piss easy red loop, you’ll be fine on all our reds!”, but the uplift red is probably harder than the black demo loop. So this restores balance to the force.)

More stuff like that- loved how Blue Scar at Afan starts with a gruesome climb then the first real descent is called WIDOWMAKER and has not just skulls and crossbones at the top, but what seems to be a grave. Is This Trail For You? Class wee blue route though, enjoyed it more than Penhydd