Walking on the Brecon Beacons. David Whittaker

still has its oak lintel in place and a surprisingly large tree emerges halfway up the front of the chimney breast. Its roots have penetrated through the stones and into the ground below.

      From the ruins turn left by the wire fence and up the track to a stile and so to the path running along the hillside 50m above. Turn right (SSW), following the path towards the head of the valley. The hill fence turns right and drops down to the river bed.

      In front of you on the right is the prow of Cribyn and the ridge running round from that to the gap of the Roman Road and Fan y Big on your left.

      Continue along the east side of the valley above the stream down to the right. Eventually the indistinct path you are following meets the stream bed at a hawthorn tree and old stone enclosures (hafodydd).

      The ruined stone enclosures in this area were originally small buildings and pens, called hafodydd, used when flocks were moved to higher pastures in the spring. One stone is inscribed with ‘G.H.’, the initials of the Gwynne Halfords of Buckland, a large land-owning family in Victorian times.

      Leave the stream course here and strike up left onto the lower reaches of Fan y Big on which there is a double row of small rock outcrops which should be passed on the left-hand side. Traverse right above the lower outcrops and climb steadily to the Roman Road.

      You will want to catch your breath after this sustained climb and there are plenty of interesting features to see from this good viewpoint. Down below in the head of the valley is an interesting glacial feature (see ‘Head of Cwm Cynwyn’). Up above to the west is the impressive crag of Craig Cwm Cynwyn (see Walk 10) formed from resistant Brownstones (see ‘Geology of the Brecon Beacons,’ Walk 21). Finally, you may well be resting on a once busy Roman thoroughfare.

      Looking along Craig Cwm Cynwyn to the summits of Cribyn and Pen y Fan

      HEAD OF CWM CYNWYN