H
Huw Pritchard
Guest
When Andy Chequer announced his intention to come to Swansea for a day or so, I suggested that he
bring Binkie, his trusty GT Zaskar. So, today we headed off to Afan Argoed for a bit of a spin on
the new Whites Level trail. 10am this morning it decided to have a quick rain shower, and we were
wondering if this was really a good idea or not.
Anyway, with breakfast at the local cafe done and dusted, we headed off to Afan. The trail is so new
that it's not actually signposted from the carpark yet, but we managed to get a garbled sheet of
instructions considting of about ten lines of capital letters with no punctuation from the bike hire
place and set off to find the trail.
After a length of paved track that was starting to get worryingly long, we eventually found the
trail and were pleased to find it dry and hard packed. Marvelous!
Riding on a bit further, all was not so well. In fact it was rather boggy. Chequer was beginning to
curse his V-brakes for getting clogged with mud, and even my Orange was experiencing problems, the
mud was so claggy that fist sized rocks were being picked up and getting stuck between the seat
stays. Eventually everything got so clogged that Binkie was incapable of being pushed, let alone
ridden and we decided that in the interests of curbing trail erosion and our own sanity, that we
should head back down the trail.
I was somewhat pleased to find that the trail was a lot more ridable in reverse, and eventually we
managed to get back onto something hard and dry. Sadly it degenerated into something akin to going
to the zoo with the chimps (Chequer) throwing their own fecaes (mud) at you. After announcing that I
wasn't going to play with him anymore, we headed apace back to the visitor centre apace for tea and
fruitcake, a spot of washing of bicycles and then back home.
Should be a nice trail, but definately needs to be drier before we ride it again.
--
Huw "Hnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnngh!" Pritchard
bring Binkie, his trusty GT Zaskar. So, today we headed off to Afan Argoed for a bit of a spin on
the new Whites Level trail. 10am this morning it decided to have a quick rain shower, and we were
wondering if this was really a good idea or not.
Anyway, with breakfast at the local cafe done and dusted, we headed off to Afan. The trail is so new
that it's not actually signposted from the carpark yet, but we managed to get a garbled sheet of
instructions considting of about ten lines of capital letters with no punctuation from the bike hire
place and set off to find the trail.
After a length of paved track that was starting to get worryingly long, we eventually found the
trail and were pleased to find it dry and hard packed. Marvelous!
Riding on a bit further, all was not so well. In fact it was rather boggy. Chequer was beginning to
curse his V-brakes for getting clogged with mud, and even my Orange was experiencing problems, the
mud was so claggy that fist sized rocks were being picked up and getting stuck between the seat
stays. Eventually everything got so clogged that Binkie was incapable of being pushed, let alone
ridden and we decided that in the interests of curbing trail erosion and our own sanity, that we
should head back down the trail.
I was somewhat pleased to find that the trail was a lot more ridable in reverse, and eventually we
managed to get back onto something hard and dry. Sadly it degenerated into something akin to going
to the zoo with the chimps (Chequer) throwing their own fecaes (mud) at you. After announcing that I
wasn't going to play with him anymore, we headed apace back to the visitor centre apace for tea and
fruitcake, a spot of washing of bicycles and then back home.
Should be a nice trail, but definately needs to be drier before we ride it again.
--
Huw "Hnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnngh!" Pritchard
