It was nice to be back walking again after a four month break. Over the next 4 days we planned to walk up and down the Dyfi valley from Tre’r-ddol to Aberdovey and then on to Llwyngwril, a total of 34 miles. From the maps and Google Earth it looked “hilly” but the route proved to be much more difficult that I had anticipated.

Tre’r-ddol to Machynlleth: 10.1 miles (16.2km) +635m -638m (12 September 2016)

We caught the bus from Machynlleth, where we were staying, to Tre’r-ddol at 9:30 and 20 minutes later we were walking. On leaving Tre’r-ddol the path took us up through woodland and across a small stream.

The path then climbed around Foel Fawr where we were met by a group of ponies who appeared to be walking the coast path in the other direction.

The next part of the route undulated quite a lot and we regularly lost the path due to a lack of signage. A new bridleway had recently been established with new gates and waymarks for the bridleway but unfortunately the coast path signs had not been put back. At one point we almost took the wrong track which would have led us back to where we were 30 minutes earlier.

From the top there were wonderful views over the Dyfi estuary and the railway viaduct.

After a few wrong turns we arrived at the Llyfnant Valley where the going was much flatter. After this there were more ups and downs until we reached a point that overlooked Machynlleth. To get down to the town we had to descend the “Roman Steps”, a series of steps cut into the stone. It was very slippery and more than one of us fell. I was relieved when we all got to the bottom safely. It was then a short walk back to the hotel along the roads.

I had pessimistically estimated that we would be walking for 6 hours but as there was a lot more ascent and descent than I had envisaged, we took just over 7 hours.