Brecons with WMC

Jo and I headed down to meet the club at the Llangorse meet a couple of weekends ago with a bunch of beer and a bottle of wine ready for the obligatory drinking.  We didn't arrive until around 8pm ish and proceeded to crack open some ales.  I've not really played dominoes with the club but sat and had a few games and enjoyed it - despite not being able to hold my dommies like a "mon"!  Jo, Geordie and I stayed up drinking until about 1pm ish.  Nice prep for a day out on the hill!

We got up and out around 9am, feeling a bit rough but with a belly full of porridge for a day out on the hill.  We'd got a route planned which I'd made a GPX for.  We drove through Brecon and on for about 30 mins to Glyntawe and set out, it was a beautiful day.

After a short steep pull we were up to the ridge of Fan Hir, this was the majority of the height gain for the day and the views were cracking.

Me on the ridge to Fan Hir

We carried on along the ridge, enjoying the views.  With a small down and up we were on the summit of Fan Brycheiniog with a trig point (if memory serves me right).

Jo at the trig of Fan Brycheiniog

We stopped for a spot of lunch and then started up to the final summit of the ridge; Bannau Sir Gaer, for the most spectular view of the day above Llyn-y-Fan which has a bothy on its shore.

Jo above Llyn-y-fan

At this point we deviated from the beaten track to head for the final summit of the day; Garreg Las.  This is the great thing with bagging hills, it often takes you to places you wouldn't normally go.  The three hills we did previously would seem like an obvious route and Garreg Las is out of the way and over rougher ground with a poorly defined path.  We didn't really try and get onto the col between Garreg Las and Carreg yr Ogof, instead opting for a direct line to the stone shelters at the summit.

Jo and I in the shelter on the summit of Garreg Las

We dropped back down onto the col and then over Esgair Ddu and down the other side and crossed the stream, from here on there were loads of swallow holes and a pot hole - if it hadn't been getting late I would like to have looked for it.  After a short pull over the small hill of Banwen Gwyn we skirted around Disgwylfa to drop down to the Campsite and a short walk back car, we just got back as the light was fading.

I was pretty zonked after not having a full day in the hills for ages.  We walked down from the farm we were staying at to Llangorse for some grub, where Jason a new guy to the WMC was on a blind date - much to the mocking of some of the guys in the club.  He had a smile on his face so I guess it was going well....  We stayed for a quick drink and had a Pendryn before walking back.  We drank the rest of the booze and got some kip.

The next day we rolled out of bed at 9am and thought about going for a walk, or maybe climbing at the wall in the accommodation but apparently you needed to join and therefore it was quick steep in cost!  We had a look and it looked quite sweet.  We hatched a plan to head back via Church Stretton as I kept promising to show Jo the Shropshire Hills every time we were over.  We had a spot of food at the top of the burway as a nice way to end the weekend.

Since then I've been running more and climbing every tuesday.  I also went along to meet some of the guys at the bowline climbing club at their AGM.  I got a couple of numbers for some of the guys and hope to do some running and climbing with them this year now meeting the WMC guys is so difficult in the week.