Gyrn Ddu

Also known as:
Gyrn Ddu (East)
Nearest town:
Pwllheli (12km SSW)
OS reference:
SH40584667
OS sheets:
115, 123
Latitude:
52° 59' 35.56 N
Longitude:
4° 22' 31.92 W
Added to TMA by

Images

Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by GLADMAN

Gyrn Ddu and its hunched cairned-bearing shoulders from the wondrous Tre’r Ceiri

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Nov 5, 2022
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by GLADMAN

A retrospective of the cairns (centre right) from the summit of Gyrn Ddu

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Nov 5, 2022
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by GLADMAN

Worth the climb for the views alone, to be honest. looking east towards The fabulous Nantlle Ridge and the heart of Northern Snowdonia. Pen-y-Gaer is to right.

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Nov 5, 2022
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by GLADMAN

Northward towards an (apparently) cairn-less Gyrn Goch from the northern cairn. Note the additional cairn beyond... do we have a cemetery here?

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Nov 5, 2022
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by GLADMAN

Yr Eifl from a VERY windy southern cairn... Tre’r Ceiri resides upon the left-hand peak.

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Nov 5, 2022
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by GLADMAN

A segment of the northern cairn from the southern... the very intrusive walling makes appreciation of scale difficult to say the least... however Coflein reckons both cairns are c45ft in diameter.

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Nov 5, 2022
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by GLADMAN

The southern monument is bisected by a dirty big drystone wall (the northern dissected by two) and is currently the ‘taller’ of the two...

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Nov 5, 2022
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by GLADMAN

The pair of cairns sited to the east of Gyrn Ddu, looking from the northern to southern.

Image credit: Robert Gladstone
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Nov 5, 2022
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by thesweetcheat

Gyrn Ddu is the hill to the left of centre. Seen from the road between Tre’r Ceiri and Llanaelhaearn.

Image credit: A. Brookes (8.5.2016)
thesweetcheat
thesweetcheat May 31, 2016
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by postman

The summit is the peak on the left, the pair of cairns are on the summit on the right, off picture left is Gyrn Ddu cairn.
I ascended from here, left of the house, up to the left to right wall then up!

Image credit: Chris Bickerton
postman
postman Aug 17, 2015
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by postman

A big Snowdonian cairn that Gladman hasn’t been to, I didn’t know there was such a thing.

Image credit: Chris Bickerton
postman
postman Aug 17, 2015
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by postman

Big cairn with Pen-y-Gaer and Moel-y-Gest hill forts on it’s right.

Image credit: Chris Bickerton
postman
postman Aug 17, 2015
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by postman

The wall should be torn down, the cairn reinstated to it’s rightful shape, and the wall builder put in the stocks
with poo covered bricks handed out to the throwing public.
Too much ?

Image credit: Chris Bickerton
postman
postman Aug 17, 2015
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by postman

T’other side of the wall, the neighbouring cairn can be seen lower right.

Image credit: Chris Bickerton
postman
postman Aug 17, 2015
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by postman

The smaller of the two cairns has been even more badly treated, you have to look on three sides of two walls to see it all.

Image credit: Chris Bickerton
postman
postman Aug 17, 2015
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by postman

Part one of three of the smaller cairn, Pen-y-Gaer and Moel-y-Gest hill forts off to the left.

Image credit: Chris Bickerton
postman
postman Aug 17, 2015
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by postman

Two parts out of three of the smaller cairn, and one half of the bigger cairn.

Image credit: Chris Bickerton
postman
postman Aug 17, 2015
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by postman

The smallest part of the smaller cairn and half of the big cairn, Mynydd Carnguwch off to the right.

Image credit: Chris Bickerton
postman
postman Aug 17, 2015
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by postman

Half of the big cairn and some big mountains.

Image credit: Chris Bickerton
postman
postman Aug 17, 2015
Image of Gyrn Ddu (Cairn(s)) by postman

Zoomed at from up Pen-y-Gaer hill fort, you can see where the wall goes over the bigger cairn, the other cairn is to its right under the wall that comes up from the right.

Image credit: Chris Bickerton
postman
postman Aug 17, 2015

Articles

Gyrn Ddu

postman
postman Aug 17, 2015

You could combine a trip up to these cairns with a visit to Pen-y-Gaer hill fort, but I didn’t fancy the long walk back, so I went back to the car and drove closer and walked from there.
There, being the small dead end lane that runs west/east south of the mountain. I parked the car in an unused and overgrown gateway, so far so good, but then the footpath marked on my map has disappeared, it says the path goes past a farm house called Llethr-ddu, so I trust in the ordnance survey and go that way, despite a complete lack of footpath signs and stiles, I felt a bit trespassery here, but I tuned it out and concentrated more on the scenery. Mostly the scenery consists of The Rivals, ie; Tre’r Ceiri and Mynydd Carnguwch, the loveliest of all Welsh hills.
As I leave the farm house behind me I’m passing along some old walls with frankly massive boulders in them, dismantled dolmens I’m sure.... not.
Getting higher, the hill fort I went to earlier rises above the near horizon, provided by Moel Bronmiod, itself topped with, no, not a cairn but a large Dartmoorish rocky tor, I’d quite like to be up there, but you cant go everywhere at once, though I’ve heard of a man who knows someone who can.
As I get up towards the top the ground gets distinctively more rocky, progress can be quicker and easier but more dangerous, i’m about 9/10ths of the way up and my daughter sends me a text saying were going out for tea with Grandma, I’ve got three and a quarter hours to get home, well screw that I decide, an intense flurry of texts ensue, a bizarre thing to be doing in such a place as this, and problem sorted, they’ll all wait for me to get home. I am the man.

One tenth further on and i’m confronted with two of the best yet badliest? treated hill top cairns I’ve ever had the pleasure to behold.
Some dense twat has built two walls over them, clearly and depressingly out of the cairns themselves.
The big cairn has a wall run right through it, either side of the wall is a canyon where the stones have been stolen.
The smaller cairn has two walls meet right on top of it, making photographing the whole cairn impossible. One side of a wall has a very small amount of cairn, it was this bit I saw first, I thought “hunh?” then looked over the wall and saw much more on the other side, but a wall runs through that as well. All very bad.
The culprit should be chastised, extremely chastised, take a moment, stop reading and think of something horrible we could, nay should do to him, it was bound to be a he, probably American.

But it’s not all bad, despite the intrusions the cairns are still there, large and comforting, and the stone that has been robbed hasn’t gone far.
I decide a walkabout is now due, so I skip lightly across towards the summit, I’ve also decided that getting to the rocky toppest of Gyrn Ddu’s summits, can wait for another time, but just below it is a grassy knoll that would make a good place to get the big cairns with all of Snowdonia behind, plus another cairn is over this way, if it’s not too far I’ll go take a look.
It’s probably about now that I should mention the view from up here, it’s pretty good.
Nope, I cant do it, the view is impeccable, the eyes are glued to the Lleyn peninsula, The Rivals vie for attention among themselves, the over quarried one losing every time. Mynydd Carnguwch, is the sweetest most perfectly shaped hill in the known world, it fits in the vision like something soft and warm in the hand. Wow.
Time to go, I skirt around Gyrn Ddu’s summit until the the other cairn comes into view, it is indeed too far, a quick zoom through the camera and I’m away, stumbling with shaking legs, not looking forward to the frantic drive home, but so glad I took the time to get over to this under achieving part of North Wales.

I was right to be not looking forward to the drive home the A55 has of late been over ridden with cars going no where important, and three road accidents had to be gotten through, who is passing these idiots, any idiot can pass his test, but not anyone can remain incident free for 25 years and still be doing five times as many miles per year. Grumpy!

Miscellaneous

Gyrn Ddu
Cairn(s)
GLADMAN
GLADMAN Nov 23, 2022

At 1,713ft Gyrn Ddu – together with its slightly lower neighbour Gyrn Goch – may well not feature upon the itineraries of those route-marching muppets who pigeonhole the Great Outdoors by the sole criterion of ‘height’ above Ordnance Datum... however, more fool them, I say. Particularly if one happens to possess a penchant for ancient upland cairns... a Citizen Cairn, you might say?

Now Gyrn Ddu has not one, but a trio of such enigmatic monuments perched upon its eastern (two) and western shoulders, all of which can be visited by way of a circular walk starting from the A499, below to the west. In addition, a number of ancient hut groupings can be seen along the way... hey, the former homes of the folks who erected the cairns back in the day, right? Makes sense to me.

Beware of the so-called ‘experts’ who may tell you this is an ‘easy walk’. For sure, the logical anti-clockwise route from Rock Cottage, albeit a touch steep in places, may well be upon grass all the way to these two eastern cairns.... but any punter making the progression to the summit and subsequent descent to the fine western monument will encounter far rougher terrain more reminiscent of Y Rhinogydd. So watch those ankles...

The cairns upon this eastern shoulder are unfortunately bisected by parasitical drystone walls clearly sourced from the monuments, yet nevertheless remain pretty substantial: Coflein reckons both are c45ft in diameter, the southern somewhat higher nowadays (although whether there was originally such disparity is a moot point, given the damage). Interestingly, I noted another, smaller cairn immediately beyond the northern monument. Do we have a cemetery here?

Whatever, it is the utterly wondrous vistas towards the rest of Lleyn – Tre’r Ceiri and Mynydd Carnguwch taking centre stage – not to mention more-or-less the whole of Northern Snowdonia, which form la pièce de résistance of this place.

Sites within 20km of Gyrn Ddu

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