Bugeilyn is a name that can leave even the hardest of vetrans quaking in their Sidi's. I was surprised to learn that Mike had never had the pleasure of this particular stretch of serpentine singletrack, so I suggested that we should pay it a visit. It was a gamble but a calculated one and luckily it payed off. We were rewarded with a largely rideable passage through the mountains. Wondering whether our luck would continue to hold, we threw the dice again and elected to cross the river to see what lay on the other side. After removing shoes and socks we stumbled across the slimy rocks and sat in the sun waiting for our feet to dry.
As stupid ideas go, this one was borderline genius and left us in no doubt that lady luck had deserted us in favour of an afternoon at the bingo. A kilometer of the finest, high grade tussocky bog lay between us and any cycleable surface ... undeterred we (death) marched on until we eventually reached firmer ground. Anyone blessed with a modicum of common sense would have taken this as a stern warning, so I'll leave you to decide why it was that less than an hour later we turned off the smooth flat surface beneath our tyres and started to push up a steep, eroded rock chute. I knew where this particular detour would eventually deposit us but what lay between where we were and where we would be, was completely unknown.
This time, we didn't receive wet feet ... this time, we received muddy wet feet. The track was a quagmire but eventually we did make our way through the maze of foot deep ruts and just like Mr Ben stepping out from the changing room, found ourselves in a different world. It was a world of technical rock track, the kind of place where speed isn't your friend - poise, balance and a keen eye for a line were your allies here. Thankfully we'd remembered to pack a little of each which allowed us to reach the bottom with less than a handfull of 'f**k me moments' tallied up.
The remainder of the afternoon followed in the same vain ... veering off perfectly good tracks we knew well and onto and into the unknown. Lengthening shadows lead us to the first refreshment stop of the day and a cardboard cup of Typhoo and the largest chocolate eclair I've ever had the pleasure to eat. Perhaps surprisingly, the second refreshment stop came less than ten minutes after the first but it was a much longer affair.
It was dark when we left the pub but we pedalled up the road satisfied in the knowledge that our accommodation was only half an hour away. After evicting the slugs who'd bagged the best spots, we readied ourselves for bed and retired with a mug of rock 'n roll Ovaltine.
Eight hours later, we sat at a table inside a warm welcoming cafe and watched the rain bouncing off our bikes. We knew that once breakfast was over, no matter what, we were going to get wet, really wet. We had a decision to make ... we could minimise the discomfort and elect to travel the path of least resistance or we could go right over the top of the highest mountain in mid-Wales. It's something we'd done before on a bitterly cold and wet new years eve - be nice to see it in summer we thought and that's something we're still thinking.
By the time we'd conqured the summit, an immense sense of deja vu had settled on my shoulders and if we hadn't had been travelling in the opposite direction, I would have sworn it was December 31st ... the weather and conditions were nearly indentical. The descent was an exercise in snap decision making, get it wrong and the track would peter out into nothing, lead to very large (yet thankfully rideable) drops or present you to the sharp end of a barbed wire fence.
Once off the mountain, we had one last throw of the dice. I'm not sure what the odds of finding something like this would be, but ten joy filled minutes later we stood giggling like nine year old girls who'd won the lottery. Not only had we just thrown ourselves down one of the best bits of track I've ever ridden but the sun had also made an appearance, meaning we could ditch the Marilgolds we'd being wearing all day.
that summed it up perfect stu! Here are some pictures to add to the story