GLADMAN
Pen y Foel Goch.... like Carn Wen it’s – nowadays anyhow – not clear how much of the fabric was placed by human agency... and how much by primeval forces. But perhaps that was always the point. As the Spice Girls said... ‘when two become one’.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Set above and to the approx. east of the great Carn Wen, the summit of Foel Goch possesses a pretty substantial monument, too.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
The ‘shelter’ highlights lack of visiting muppets by providing a home for a pretty tenacious tree...
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Toward Moel y Llyn and it’s Bronze Age cemetery
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
A sizeable footprint on this one...
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
The cairn stands overlooking Cwm Einion... Artist’s Valley.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Looking across the monument toward the seriously be-cairned Moel y Llyn
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Sunburst upon the curiously grassy summit of the cairn. Cadair Idris (top right) heralds a distinct change in topography
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Intrigued at how, since the crafty buggers planted Carn Wen upon a shattered outcrop, the demarcation between the two is almost imperceptible. I like being intrigued.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Carn Wen is wonderfully, nay exquisitely sited, here looking north across the Afon Dyfi to The Tarrens..
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Approx south-east toward the heart of Pumlumon. Moel y Llyn, with it’s own monuments, can be seen top left.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
The White Cairn. Should’ve gone to Specsavers...
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Looking approx south-west from Carn Wen across the supposed location of several cairns (wasn’t convinced, for what it’s worth) and the Afon Clettwr. Incidentally there is a fine cist beyond the river, together with the excellent Bedd Taliesen (near the distant copse). Suffice to say I’d be very surprised if the uprights are an original feature....
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
A – it has to be said – not very pearly white Carn Wen, approaching from the approx south-west. The summit of Foel Goch... Pen y Foel Goch.. not surprisingly rises beyond.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Looking north toward Bwlch-y-Ddau-Faen I decided, on the spur of the moment, to head for Carnau about 1 and half miles distant.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Highlighting the deep gulley cut by the Nant Paradwys... the inexorable power of water, eh?
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Volatile conditions can have their compensations... some rather exquisite.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Very approx NW toward Rhiwnant. Nice. There is another cairn away to the right which, for some reason wasn’t on my old 1:50K map.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Fine upland cairn, this one.... overlooking the cascading Nant Paradwys. Drygarn Fawr can be seen top left, this an alternative route to that peak than from Abergwesyn Pass.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Not the best of images... but nonetheless showing the kerb stones from within.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
The interior has been gutted – as usually the case – but stupid is as stupid does.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Drygarn Fawr rises beyond. Well worth a wander, too.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Note the kerb stones, foreground. Bwlch-y-Ddau-Faen, complete with enigmatic standing (and not so upstanding) stones – I won’t call it a circle – lies beyond the near rise to right.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Not as decent a monument as my original goal for the day – the excellent Waun at SN897599 – this is nevertheless a substantial cairn with the bonus of surviving kerb stones in situ. And, most important of all, a quite superb upland vibe.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Drygarn Fawr from Carnau... sure, I’ve been to more dramatic places, but few which get closer to defining that ultimately indefinable essence of ‘wilderness’.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Another upright can be seen foreground, one of two obvious stones upon the northern arc. Difficult to see how the remaining – or at least visible – stones fit into a neat, classic circle... but, bearing in mind the boggy, peat hag ridden topography... and with ‘modern’ boundary stones so nearby... I’d say a prehistoric origin is a possibility. By a spring, too.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Looking approx westward across this enigmatic grouping of stones. An historic boundary stone can be seen to the right of my (red) rucksack...with another top right upon the way to Carnau
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
Looking south toward the great escarpment of South Wales. There are at least three fallen/sunken stones arcing beyond.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
The approx southern arc. If the surviving uprights were pairs – as suggested, perhaps, by the nomenclature of the site – then what were these about?
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
The most substantial orthostat of what, as I poked around, quickly become very much a stone ring, if not ‘circle..... a beautiful slab of stone.
Image credit: Robert Gladstone