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Cwm Clydach Crossing Traditional Geocache

Difficulty:
1.5 out of 5
Terrain:
2.5 out of 5

Size: Size:   small (small)

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Geocache Description:

This is meant to provide a pleasant walk up Cwm Clydach (Clydach Valley), alongside the Lower Clydach River along an established and well signposted footpath, arriving at a curious stone bridge that appears out of place in its location today. Walking boots/wellies are recommended if its been wet as the path can get a little muddy in places.

There are a number of public footpaths that can take you to this cache but the route Eclectic Penguin suggested is to park at 51°43.421N 3°54.148W in a lay-bay large enough to accommodate at least a couple of cars next to the next bridge down on the river from the cache location.

From here it's a walk of about a mile along a public footpath that's signposted throughout.

The route should take you through a variety of different sceneries - from riverside path to walks through fields adorned with wild flowers. Whatever the weather, keep your eye out for wildlife - EP walked within 5 metres of a fox while taking the cache to its destination.

The first stage was actually a railway to a coal mine - there's very little evidence of this though; either railway or mine these days. This area was littered with small mines and there were once two mineral railway lines running up this valley.

The final destination is on what would have been a well engineered road crossing when it was built - one of the many highways and byways that have fallen into disuse over the years.

EP said disused .. one of his reasons for visiting this area was the fact that his early GPS sat-nav regularly tried to direct him along this track whenever he was in this area. Clearly an error - only a quad bike or a sturdy 4x4 could negotiate this muddy track, which appears to disappear all together once over the bridge.

The cache is ~500ml small plastic container, which started with a couple of small toy cars (in homage to the road bridge that has probably never seen a road vehicle other than a 4x4 or the occasional tractor) and a Geocoin.


Additional Hints (Decrypt)

Onfr bs gerr ba abegu jrfg raq bs oevqtr

Decryption Key

A|B|C|D|E|F|G|H|I|J|K|L|M
-------------------------
N|O|P|Q|R|S|T|U|V|W|X|Y|Z

(letter above equals below, and vice versa)