Fishguard and far north are miles apart but not really so different

OUT AND ABOUT WITH RALPH: A flying visit to south Wales is an opportunity to revisit once familiar hills and coast

From Caithness, only Land’s End in the UK is more difficult to reach than Fishguard in south-west Wales – it would be over 700 miles by road.

But I wanted to meet up for a flying visit with my brother who was over from the States. And not wishing to spend four days driving, flying it would have to be.

The times of the buses and trains were just wrong, meaning I needed the 8.30 train to Inverness in order to catch a flight which left the airport not long before six. It would be a very leisurely day, always a nice train ride with the highlight being two sea-eagles sitting like huge sculptures on fence posts near Kinbrace.

Not having walked round Inverness for a while, I found the town surprisingly down-at-heel. But the Ness Islands were as good as ever, to spend a couple of hours walking out from the town centre along the the river and back. The Ness was flowing nicely after recent rains.

For me, flying is always a miracle, I find airports fascinating and do my best to get a window seat so I can stare out at the weather and clouds and the towns, lochs and hills far below. How can people be so blasé that they read a book during take-off?

Canadian fire smoke created a thick haze which hid the views after initial glimpses down Loch Ness to Meall Fuar-mhonaidh, heading south to Bristol we met the high cirrus of the next approaching weather front and Bristol airport was grey with approaching rain.

I like to walk to or from an airport but draw the line at busy main roads with no footpaths, so needed the shuttle bus the next morning to take me to the car hire.

Soon I was onto the “new” Severn crossing above miles of mud and sand at low tide, then on through the heartland of industrial Wales to strike up the Rhondda past Merthyr Tydfil, once one of the most important industrial towns in the world. Now the valleys are green again with new woodland covering the old tips and slag-heaps.

It’s over 50 years since I last visited the Brecon Beacons and I looked forward to freshening up with an easy walk up to Pen Y Fan, the highest point in South Wales at just over 2900 feet.

A very well constructed and busy path took me steadily up from a big car park to the steeply scalloped peaks of banded sandstone and a sky full of red kites, with long views to the once-familiar Black Mountains and across the patchwork of fields and hills stretching west.

After that I drove on by miles of little roads, tiny villages and rolling green hills of fields and sheep.

We took a few sallies along the the Pembrokeshire Coast path which winds for 150 miles round clifftops, coves, gulleys and stony beaches not dissimilar to north Sutherland. At least 500 people walk it for every one on the north coast – it’s a path well maintained, strimmed and signed.

Unlike certain parts of the north, the local farmers have learned to live in harmony with the tourists!

At one point we walked slowly behind 300 cows making their leisurely way to the milking parlour. The same coastal wild flowers were out, thrift, thyme, a much brighter yellow kidney vetch, saxifrage, blue squill, lots of red and white campion, foxgloves. But also the white lesser bindweed, mallow, and the orchid-like ivy broomrape.

The wide sands of Whitesands Bay near St David’s could almost have been Strathy or Dunnet except for the flags and lifeguards and the huge car park with attendant. Many were out surfing the small waves.

Three short days and time to head home, I was determined to do the journey in one day and left Fishguard at four in the morning to drive back to Bristol. A very peaceful first hour through tree-scented dark on empty roads with the dawn chorus drifting in the windows.

Then onto the motorway, which by six in the morning was solid with traffic, headlights in the rain, probably commuters to London only 120 miles away. Safely back at the airport I was very glad to sit and relax in the lounges and on the plane.

The train north from Inverness was replaced by a bus, hot and stuffy with no suspension on potholed roads, but it made up time after taking forever round Beauly and Dingwall and I was home before six, can’t complain.

But next time I go to Fishguard I think I’ll take the bike and two weeks over the journey!

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