Landimore Marsh, Cheriton, Burry Pill and Weobley Castle

23rd of November 2014

 

 

 



 

I was tasked this week with following on from Janet's popular walk in Dyffryn woods and the Drummau mountains. It would appear, as far as numbers are concerned anyway, that I failed miserably. As we all know by now we shouldn't let appearances fool us though. Final attendance on today's walk was just the six: myself, the ever reliable Caroline Williams and Silvana Powell, Jonathan Jones, Julian Evans and the long lost Anwen Cale. Anwen's appearance was led by her not wanting to turn up for our New Year trip to Milford Haven looking like a holiday scrubber...but we'll let that pass for now. Unfortunately we were missing Dave, Trich and Tyrion because of unforeseen circumstances and we lost a certain unnamed person due to...ahem...rugby led over indulgence. For shame!

 

We're a determined lot with the Tawe Trekkers though so on we trudged from the starting point at Landimore Marsh. We followed the Wales Coastal Path initially until we reached a rough old road and turned left to Llanmadoc. The route had already proven to be muddy by this stage and we were all nursing the mud stains as we reached a bit of civilization. In Llanmadoc we followed the road left, all aiming our best pining glances at the Britannia Inn as we passed, until we reached the church of St Cadoc in Cheriton. Sometimes known as the "Cathedral of Gower" (thank you Wikipedia) this church is actually a Grade 1 listed building and is thought to have been built in the 14th century.

 

Opposite the Cathedral of Gower there is a clearly marked footpath sign leading past Gower Pottery, through a small wood path and then into some fields. From this point we were able to follow the Burry Pill on our right all the way to Stembridge, a rarely visited area of the Gower. Here we had to join a main road for a while as we trudged uphill to a pretty dilapidated old farm with a lot of barking dogs. We quickly scuttled past, joining a rough track in some fields that ultimately led to an ancient standing stone. As we walked through these fields I had to encourage everyone not to miss the opportunity to glance back and experience the spectacular view of Cefn Bryn that we had. It was this point that we truly realised how lucky we were to have the weather.

 

 



 

Eventually we reached Windmill Farm and turning downhill towards the coast we were met a great view of Weobley Castle, spoilt only by two houses that I spent the next 5 minutes moaning about. "They'd never get planning permission now" I quite rationally stated! We didn't stay too long at Weobley Castle but instead chose to pass it on our right and walk back out on to Landimore where we were met with this brilliant opportunity for a group 'selfie' with the castle in the background (note how Caroline managed to weasle her way out of the shot).

 

 



 

From this point it was a simple case of passing through some more muddy fields back to the start point at Landimore Marsh. Now your average walking group would at this point have parted ways back to their comfy middle-class hum-drum lives. Not us at the Tawe Trekkers though! We quickly got out of our muddy kits, changed into something a little more presentable (I had to tell Silvana to stop checking out my sexay legs at this point) and made our way to the Greyhound Inn for a taste of some fine ale and a damn fine Sunday dinner.  For those of you interested following our previous visit here the person serving us today was 14 years old. He was very good and so was the day as a whole, even if I do say so myself.

Next week the newly married Paul 'Bomber' Harris will be leading us on a walk in Ystalafera. I've been looking forward to this one for weeks now as we rarely get out to this area. I have no doubt that it will be a spectacular walk but be warned - though it's a short walk at just 7 miles it's expected to be a very strenuous one. It's a slightly early start for this one. For those interested I will meet you at Swansea Civic Centre at 9am where we will convoy to the car park at ASDA in Ystalafera to me Paul for 9:30am. Please let me know what your plans are 07540 746360 - if we don't know you are coming we will not be able to wait for you!

Diolch! Dylan