Gadfa

This is on most mornings my route to work, over Bwlch y Groes down through Gadfa into Cwm Eunant and down towards Lake Vyrnwy. While most people are crammed together like sardines on various A roads or motorways, I welcome another person sharing this amazing wilderness like a long lost friend just visiting from another country. It doesn't happen that often.

Photo by Gethin Elias

Waves of driving rain, dancing snow flakes gliding from the heavens, frozen roads have the same sensation as bobsledding, dewy mornings create endless droplets of dazzling jewels, pure sunshine not a cloud, completely white only faint markings let you know the edges of the road. Fog, what do I say about fog? “ Fatha bod mewn bol buwch" like being in a cows stomach, this is to quote Gwyn Evans. Gales blow wisps of purple moor grass like poetry across the moor. Edge hawthorns become secret after time like long forgotten Ents.

Photo by Gethin Elias

Gadfa is part of a large heft (mountain field), it’s 788ha, and has been grazed by Welsh mountain sheep and Welsh blacks for most of the year. The habitat mostly consists of blanket bog with a mixture of dry heath and acid grassland. As you get closer to the lake moorland turns to ffridd and then to woodland.


Photo by Gethin Elias

If you fancy visiting Gadfa, just follow the road to Dinas Mawddwy from Lake Vyrnwy, drive carefully and don’t forget to give me a wave as you pass. During the spring and summer months it’s also one of the best places on the reserve to see Merlin, Hen harrier, Ring ouzel, Wheatear and endless singing Skylarks.

Gethin Elias, Assistant Warden

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