Saturday 17th May, leaving Swansea for Brecon

It was a lovely sunny morning and I thought it was an hour more than it actually was, and wondered why there was no one around the streets.  So at 5.55am the moon was still over the houses, and the sun shining in the south.  Our B&B was in a street of Victorian Terraces, and had side access for parking.  They had been running it for 7 years.  There is a lot of student accommodation in the street, and most house have no parking at all.

We decided to drive up the valleys on our way to Brecon. Coal was mined in almost every hill we could see, we chose to drive up the Rhonnda Valley, which follows the Rhonnda river.  There were so many little towns along the road, and different styles of housing, probably to do with the status of the workers.

To try to get the best view, it was necessary to get onto one to the hilltops.  Not that easy, until we turned onto a bush track on an incredibly steep incline.  The views were breathtaking, and it must have been a different scene than the one in front of us when the area was buzzing with coal mines, smoke, workers and the life they led.

We drove to the Rhondda Heritage Park, built around the Tymawr coal mine that took the last coal in 1983.  There have been some terrible mining disasters over the years, the worst about 1877. I felt a bit guilty at the display about “profits before lives”, indicating the role the mine owners played, very often, not a thought for the workers.  As one of my g grandfathers owned coal mines around Newcastle, I hoped he was not of the same ilk.  There was also a timeline about the Miners Strike in 1984.   Entry was cheap 3.50 to have a tour underground hosted by one of the miners.  John took the tour, as I am claustrophobic.  He left with the guide and another couple from Canberra for the 45 minute tour, which lasted 1.5 hours!

For me, entry was free.  They had some really interesting displays, of olden day things, like spinners, manglers, cash registers and Singer sewing machines, things that we remembered easily.  Must be a sign of getting old, when we are familiar with antiques!

Like so many of the attractions, the focus is on educational qualities, but done in an interesting way.  They even had a mock (or folly) miners cottage.  Included in the miner’s houses were some very old pianos on loan from a museum.

While biding my time in the gift shop, and the displays, then even managing a full game of Candy Crush – I read quite a few of the tourist brochures.  Well I didn’t exactly understand where anything was, the language is a bit challenging!  But I found one about a steam train ride on the Brecon Mountain railway.  We had time to make the 2.00 train.  Right, that was the plan.  The station was in a place called Pant, not a town, but a dot in a haystack.  We took the long scenic route, and got to the station at 2.40.  We then had lunch at the station.

They had huge sausage rolls, John asked if they were the normal ones, “yes” she said, “do you want it heated?”

So they did, and when he bit into it, it was just that a sausage in flaky pastry!  Literally I guess a sausage roll!

A look around the station, then we put the name of our B&B into Heidi.  The place is called Talybont-on-Usk, near Brecon.  This time Heidi put us in the most narrow roads, the steepest roads, over hill and down dale, along beautiful rivers, past old stone bridges, beside sheep, and through an area full of people cycling, riding, tramping, picnicking, and just enjoying the beautiful weather and the sunshine.

Finally after a rather stressful drive, as John really gets upset when the drivers keep forcing us off the road.  When we got  here we noticed that the better road could be seen but I guess we would have missed out on the scenery if we had chosen the A40.

The setting here is very peaceful.  Lots of sheep as we look out of our window.  This is a B&B above a restaurant and was the very first place I booked when we were planning our route.  But it comes with some challenges, no shower, just a hand held one, that turns cold whenever you turn it in a different direction, a temperamental toilet, and the most annoying squeaking wooden floorboards, and while they offer WiFi it doesn’t work! And we are lucky to get one bar at all on the internet.

Brecon is 7 miles away, and we went into town to sort out the museum and our canal boat ride.  The Military Museum doesn’t open until Monday, so we will have to do that when we leave and on our way to Hereford.

It houses information about my 3^rd cousin Anthony Durnford from when he was in the Africaan War in 1879.  The British left him the scapegoat for the loss at Rorke’s Drift.  Our host here told me it is such an interesting museum with a lovely old man as the guide.  Looking forward to Monday.

We managed a seat on the 12.00 midday boat going the Monmouth to Brecon canal. So many people were out watching the canal boats returning.  There are also boats that can be hired by the hour.  Then we tried to find somewhere to eat, most places were greasy spoons, as the town hosts a lot of young Army guys, old pubs that offer discos, but no food, and we even went into the Rugby Club thinking they may have done a meal, but here the thing is to watch rugby and drink, not to eat!  We tried a couple of pubs which would have been comfortable in Saloubrious Place in Swansea.  I kept getting no internet reception on the tablet while I was trying to search for restaurants.  I had lots of bars, then I realised that our plan had stopped.  We though it would run out on 19^th for a month, but it was based on 28 days, to the hour! 

The people must have been quite short in the old days

The Military Museum

At the local Rugby club

On the Brecon to Monmouth Canal 

Rorke's Drift Pub in Brecon

Eventually we decided on an unusual restaurant at the docks, which based their meals on sharing.  I had braised pork ribs, and John had pieces of succulent beef.  Different, but nice, and the Australian wine was well priced.

So no blog for Saturday 17^th May, because without wifi, no photos can be uploaded to the cloud from my phone and I cannot connect to google.