The Wales coast path - the home run

The Wales coast path – the home run

An evening walk and the start of a week’s serious walking to get to Cardiff. Having travelled down to Cardiff that afternoon, it was over to Swansea at tea-time, then a couple of hours walking, making the most of June’s light evenings.

There has been some money spent on some areas of Swansea, and the bit where you cross the river does look rather nice these days. Yes, there are other bits where some more money needs to be spent, but credit where it’s due.

Leaving Swansea, the cycle path follows a dual carriageway, but I followed the footpath which follows a canal. Then it almost seems to head onto the M4. Of course, it does branch off immediately before you get there, but I did wonder what was coming for a moment.

After sorting out that mini spaghetti-junction, you are on the approach to Port Talbot, but somehow my maths didn’t seem to be adding up. I had found a railway station on the map which I thought it was Port Talbot Parkway, but the signs were still saying that Port Talbot was 5 miles or so away. All became clear when I reached the station, it turned out to be Baglan, but I decided that would do!

Returning to Baglan the next day, it was time to do some serious walking and see how many miles I could cover. Not as many as I initially hoped, to be honest, but it was a good walk all the same.

The first puzzle of the day was trying to get to and then out of Port Talbot! Getting to it was reasonably simple – simply head along Aberavon beach, but then trying to exit? Not so straight-forward. The path leads between two roads at a roundabout, and if you blink, you miss it, but once you are on it, it is well-marked. This is just as well, as the next section of the path leads through some back streets, where the landmarks are people’s garages and the like – it really did feel to be most odd.

Having walked close to a road to Margam, trying to get back onto the beach was not as easy as it sounds either. To either side of the path, there were signs that this was private property, and it felt most unwelcoming. As well as that, I also felt to be going in the wrong direction. I wasn’t, it’s just the way the path leads to get onto the beach, but all the same, I was glad to cross the Cynffig and reach Kenfig Sands.

Porthcawl proved to be a pleasant place, a seaside town enjoying some fine June weather, and it was a good place to stop for coffee.

Leaving Porthcawl, it was over the sands to the river Ogmore which had to be crossed at Merthyr Mawr, which translates as Big Merthyr, not to be confused with Big Bertha, that’s someone altogether different!

At Merthyr Mawr, I decided to call it a day and walked into Bridgend for the train back. I could have done more, but that was far enough for one day.

Returning to Merthyr Mawr the next day, it was raining and was also cold and wet. These really were not nice conditions for June – or for any time of year come to that.

I started by taking a taxi back to Merthyr Mawr from Bridgend, then the plan was to talk to Barry today, but due to the weather, that was not going to happen. When I realised at one point that my hands were so cold they could hardly hold anything, I decided to give up at Llanilltud Fawr. Now if you are looking for that on a map you may struggle. That is its Welsh name. In English it is usually called Llantwit Major, but as IIltud was no twit, I am going to use the Welsh name for this place. Indeed, not only was Illtud no twit, he is a saint of the church, he was an abbot and teacher, founded an abbey and college in the place that bears his name. More than that, the college is believed by some to be Britain’s earliest centre of learning. The church now stands on the site, and when I reached it, having simply plodded on through a couple more miles of wind, cold and rain, I had a brief glance inside. I was dripping wet, and there wasn’t long to wait before there was a train back to Cardiff, so I only popped my head round the door, but it was good to see part of the church being used to house a fine collection of Celtic crosses and stones.

The weather was better the next day, so when I returned to Llanilltud Fawr, I started to make progress once again and was able to get onto the beach and back on the coast path pretty quickly.

However, after a couple of miles, it was difficult to find the path, it seemed to be marked on the map as going across the beach, but it was a very rocky beach, and trying to clamber my way over the stones and rocks made for slow progress.

Things did get better when I reached the power station, a power station which had a concrete path round it. That was easy to follow and enabled me to pick up the pace again. There were a few large puddles on the other side, but I could simply walk on the sea wall round them.

The path led on to Rhoose point, the Southernmost point of mainland Wales. It is also very close to Cardiff airport – so close, in fact, that when a Thompson plane was coming into land, I had such a good view of its undercarriage it was almost indecent!

Finally, onwards through Porthkerry country park and into Barry. Barrybados they call it. Whilst it was a nice enough day, that is probably stretching a point. I ended up at the docks station, and, as I have said about the walk a few times this week, whilst I could have done more, I had tried to pack reasonably light, and needed to do a batch of laundry before the day was out!

Back to Barry, and back to the roads, this time skirting round Sully before doubling back on myself to head away from the roads, across some fields and back to the coast leading into Penarth. That is another nice seaside place, and it was time for another coffee stop (coffee stops have been quite a feature of the walk!)

From Penarth, the path leads uphill for a while, and once again doubles back on itself before dropping down onto a marvellous feat of engineering, Cardiff Bay barrage. Cardiff could be seen in the distance,

and Cardiff Bay with its millennium facelift, Millennium Centre, Senedd building, Dr Who exhibition and more places to eat or have a coffee than you can shake a stick at, is well worth exploring.

I was greeted by my colleague Mark and had lunch with him.

From Cardiff, I have previously walked to Bristol, and so, whilst I might not have stuck rigidly to the Wales coast path the whole time (indeed, I started the walk before I had heard of the Wales coast path, shortly before it was officially opened) the original plan was to walk the Welsh coast. That’s just subtly different from walking the coast path.  Know that one day soon I will have to return to walk the 11 miles between the Severn Bridge (from where my walk to Bristol took me across the border into England) and Chepstow, but given my original plan, I can now say my walk round the coast is complete.

It has been an incredible journey. Whilst there have been many miles and many days of walking on my own, it has been good to share bits of it with friends, to chat briefly with people I have met along the way, to bump into old friends quite unexpectedly on more than one occasion, and, after various stages of the walk, to share my thoughts with you, dear reader.

A couple of days after returning home, I celebrated by having yet another gentle stroll to a coffee shop and treating myself to a coffee and cream cake. Ok, so the coffee shop was at the summit of Snowdon, the gentle stroll was perhaps not all that gentle, and Snowdon is not exactly on the coast, but it did seem to be the crowning glory in so many ways.

Some people have been asking me “What’s next?” In the first instance, a rest! But I know it won’t be long before I start to get itchy feet again. Perhaps Offa’s Dyke (which could start with the missing bit, Severn Bridge to Chepstow) so that I have circumvented Wales. I’m also very conscious of the fact that although I visited Anglesey, I didn’t include any of its coastline in the walk, so that’s an obvious gap. Further afield, there is a Fife Coast path, I am looking at the Danube trail from Vienna to Bratislava, and a totally crazy idea would be Lake Michigan (but that’s 1200 miles, and to do that would require another sabbatical!)

There’ll be other walks and other ramblings of a different nature to come in the pages of this blog, but once again thanks for sharing this journey round the Wales coast path with me. Diolch yn fawr iawn i bawb. 

Gower

Back to Llanelli, back to the rain. So, what is the best way out of Llanelli? By all accounts, it’s not via the golf-club, even though that was where the path seemed to lead. Thankfully, though, there was a kind soul there who said “Look, don’t tell anyone I’ve told you this, but go up there, follow the path and jump over the fence and you’re back on the coast path” Ok, so I’ve now told everyone who happens to be reading this, but I don’t think the kind person is likely to get into any trouble – especially as there was a gap in the fence and I didn’t have to do any jumping!

The rain was non-stop for the first couple of hours. I had delayed the departure a little to allow for some of it to pass, but eventually there was only one thing to do – cover myself in waterproofs and hope for the best.

After a couple of hours of that I found a shelter in a park on the approach to Loughor. It was whilst seeking shelter that the worst of the rain stopped, and the next bit, on road heading towards Gowerton was far less miserable. The roads made for easy walking, Pen-clawdd offered a bite of lunch, and then at Crofty, the road turns onto the coast and gives stunning views all the way to Llanrhydian, views made all the better by the fact that after the morning’s deluge, it was now a beautiful afternoon.

At Llanrhydian I came across the church and could hear the organist practicing “Since Jesus came into my heart” – now that’s something I haven’t sung in years! I didn’t want to disturb him/her and my boots were wet and filthy, so I didn’t go in but it was good to hear and put a spring in my step for the rest of the way.

 Had to take the high tide diversion through Cheriton, and had to avoid the sheep! They were on the road ahead of me, and when they saw me approach, because they were scared, they ran a bit firther ahead still. If they’d run to the side, then I could have gone on my way and not disturbed them. Anyway, it was a case of dodge the sheep and follow the road all the way to Llanmadoc where I found my B&B for the evening.

The next morning, after a hearty breakfast, I continued through Llanmadoc, past the church and caravan park, then dropped down onto the beach to follow the dunes to Rhosilli. From there, it was a long and rocky, though beautiful walk through Overton and Port Eynon, made all the tougher by the fact that the walk took me right past the youth hostel where I was to be staying in that night. There was a lot more walking to do before I got back there, though! It was on round a bay and Oxwich Point to find a very welcome café just before reaching Oxwich sands. 

Then, it was onto the sands with my shoes and socks off to cross some shallow streams, over some stepping stones and on to Caswell. Because of the distance I needed to cover today,  wasn’t really taking the time to admire the scenery as I should. It was beautiful but I felt worn-out, and at this point, I decided to cheat, and head onto the road to take a short-cut to Mumbles. Again, with more time, I could have enjoyed this for the pleasant seaside place it is, but all I wanted to do was get back to where I’d left the car 2 days ago and then return to the youth hostel I had passed some hours previously.

The following day I walked the few miles along Swansea Bay from Mumbles where I left off yesterday and headed into the city centre. It was all over by mid-morning, and then it was time to head to the next adventure, “Tough Mudder”

The next section of the walk, to be covered in early June, would be the home run. The end was now in sight.

Proud to be a Christian

I’m now about 2/3 of the way through my sabbatical, and this past weekend I have had the chance to travel and meet with members of the wider Methodist family and the world church.

The main theme of the sabbatical is “Faith and homosexuality”, and this past weekend saw Pride marches take place in many cities across the world, London, New York and San Francisco to name but a few. This weekend is chosen as it is the one closest to the anniversary of the Stonewall Riots in New York, 1969.  I was fortunate enough to be invited to walk with Urban Village Church, part of the wider Methodist family, in Chicago Pride.

There was another reason why I wanted to see Chicago Pride – I wanted to see and thank members of the Marin Foundation for its “I’m sorry” campaign.

A few years ago, Andrew Marin, a Christian, was fed up of being seen as a homophobic bigot just because he happened to be a Christian. So he and others took to lining the route of Chicago Pride wearing t-shirts saying “I’m sorry”. When asked the inevitable “What are you sorry for?”, they could reply, “Sorry for the way the church has treated you”, “sorry for formerly being a Bible-banging homophobe” etc.

It’s not the sort of message you expect to hear Christians saying at Pride, more’s the pity, and there have been some wonderful conversations as a result. One photo from, I think, their first campaign, has been an internet sensation. I don’t use that word lightly, but I believe it has been shared over 20 million times. So here’s another share

When I arrived at Urban Village, I was greeted by one of their ministers and said hello to some others who had arrived early. It’s an evangelical church which meets in a theatre, and its slogan is “Bold, inclusive, relevant” (I have questions as to what I believe is an over-use of the word “relevant” in Christian circles, but I’ll let that pass on this occasion). Early on in the service there was a time of testimony, and it was the first time I can remember someone giving their testimony in church and coming out as being gay. Bless you for that, Tyler.

But as the church is not to be kept within the 4 walls, it was soon time to get the bus to the start of the Pride parade. Of course, being a typical Brit, I was looking entirely the wrong way down the street for the bus to arrive, and it came as a bit of a surprise when it arrived from behind me! I thought about trying to make a joke about “Being on’t other bus” but wondered if my American friends would get it!

Just before the Parade started we met up not only with other members of Urban Village (it’s a church on 4 sites across Chicago), but also with what must have been about 30 other churches from across the city, all with signs displaying their name. What a wonderful witness. As a number of clergy were walking wearing their clerical collars, I changed my shirt [and possibly made someone’s day in the process?? {who am I trying to kid?} J ] and the resulting photo has received over 40 likes on Facebook and at least one person has nicked it to comment on North Wales Pride! Ok, that’s still well short of 20 million, but it’s a start! J

I didn’t get many photos of the parade itself, largely because even by my standards, we were walking at a fair lick. What I do remember, though, is the enormous support, cheering and good-will from the crowd who, for the most part (I guess) are probably not regular worshippers. Indeed, my right arm was aching after the walk because of the amount of waving I had been doing. It was also fascinating to see some of the clergy walking hand-in hand with their partners. May the day come when that doesn’t raise an eyebrow.

Towards the end of the parade was the “I’m sorry” team, and it was a chance for me to hug and thank them for the work they’re doing. That was a special moment. Sadly, behind them were other Christians with the more usual banners and slogans, and in contrast to the churches represented on the walk and the “I’m sorry” team, it made me wonder just what Good News they had to offer. I had to smile, though, when, standing next to them was someone dressed as Jesus with a banner “I’m not with these guys”

At this point, the parade was at an end, and there was a moment where we ground to a halt to allow for floats etc in front of us to make their exit. Standing there, as people representing many branches of the church in Chicago, we started singing an old Sunday School chorus, just one word changed to allow us to sing it to the crowd with the Good News we were here to share “Yes, Jesus loves you, the Bible tells me so”

I had an interesting conversation with someone from Urban Village afterwards, when he commented that he thought that church in Britain was far more progressive in this matter than in the USA.  That stopped me in my tracks, and I told him that I had thought it was the other away round. I suppose in both countries, there is a wide diversity of opinion, and it’s only the negative press which makes the news.

After praying together, many of us went off for a burger, and all too soon, it was time to head our separate ways. It was a wonderful day, and gave me plenty to think about and remember for a long time to come.

On the day I arrived home, the Methodist Conference voted to allow Methodists (clergy and laity, we don’t make distinctions) to enter into same-sex marriages, and, whilst they can’t take place in church, guidelines were issued to allow a blessing if church and minister approve. The tone of the debate was wonderful, both sides watching over one another in love. I fully recognise that some will think we have gone too far, and some, like me, will think there is more work to be done, but the overall tone of the debate made me proud to be a Methodist.

Like Martin Luther King fifty years ago, I still have a dream, and these past few days, I have seen a glimpse of the dream coming true J