Wednesday, 4th May 2011
Posted by Judith on 05 May 2011 at 10:51 am | Tagged as: Beach, Holiday, Walking
On our walk yesterday, we spotted the Ropes and Ladders High Activity course right next to the National Slate Museum. We’ve always wanted to do a tree top/canopy activity thing, but in France, where we have seen them most often, they are usually closed when we pass by in autumn/spring. We got there at opening time and were the only people there. Jim, our personal guide, was a lovely lad originally from Bakewell, so we had a lot of places/experiences in common.
I only got my camera out of the car nearly at the end, but we did the middle (20 feet up) and high (40 feet up) balancing, climbing, tight rope course and then the zip line. The giant swing was a bit like a fairground ride and then we had to climb up a 25 foot pole, stand on a small platform on top of it and then leap towards and grab a trapeze. It would have been less scary if the wind hadn’t been rocking the pole. We had another go at the rope course and then went off for a cup of tea. It was really good, and a long held ambition fulfilled.
We had planned to go to Bangor, Penryn Castle and then Lladdona beach. But instead Jim suggested we go to Newborough on Anglesey. There’s an amazing beach there and you can walk along to the island of Llanddwyn.
We had a read, snooze and picnic first and then set off on the walk to the island. It’s such a huge beach that the sand density varies, so you could be walking on firm sand one minute and then be sinking down with every foot step the next. Negotiating a comfortable route made it a lot more interesting. We finally got to the little island and light houses. There are still wardens’ cottages and it’s a nature reserve, so lots of wild flowers. On our walk back the tide had gone out further, almost doubling the size of the beach.
It’s been a lovely three days away, with warm sunshine and stunning views. We spent over 14 hours walking and did over 1000 m of ascent. My knees really need a rest now. Looking at the forecast, they’re going to get it!
2 Responses to “Wednesday, 4th May 2011”
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The dunes at Newborough are flyable – I tried two years ago on a blown out BPCup day, but the wind was not actually strong enough and too far off. I also used to go Tope and Bass fishing at the island a very long time ago when I went on a camping and fishing holiday after we’d done our ‘O’ levels and slept on a bench after leaving the island after one all night session – oh joyfull memories. Cycling on that sand was hard work.
It was flyable at Bache on Wednesday, but Martin and I both independently decided the rough bits were too rough to go over the back. In the thermals it was great (we got to around 4000ASL without going over the back !) – just the non thermal air. It also only started getting a good sky around the time we landed to pack up at 3;30 – it being too late by then to get to North Wales coast so we thought. With Hindsight it probably would have got better the later we left it, and it may have worked for long enough to have done most of the way there. The thermals were very strong as the sun came out, but was quite windy.