#22.Bryn Alyn Limestone Pavement.3-4-11.

We only wanted a small walk today as we had quite a few drink's last night with my cousin Garry who was over from the Isle of Man and we woke up with thick head's this morning.It was a glorious sunny morning and like a fool i didn't check the weather forecast and took all our wet gear out of the rucksack,i even suggested that we wear shorts.We left after 10 a.m. for the short drive to Llanferres and after a few miles we could see some moody black cloud's in the sky,oh dear.We had 1 shower driving there that didn't last long and soon the blue skies overhead returned.We parked in the lay-by a little further up the road from the Druid Inn and entered the field and walked down to the River Alyn,crossed this small bridge and looked up to Bryn Alyn.

We passed 3 people,the only people we saw all day,returning to their car absolutely soaked and hoped we would not suffer the same fate.Looking back to where the car is parked.

The path followed this bridle path past a lime kiln and this quarry.

It was still sunny and warm but on the horizon we could see some dark cloud's looming and looking across to Moel Famau she was in cloud.

With the sun shining and the rain cloud's in the area we saw quite a few rainbow's today.

After passing a few cottages the path rises steeply up to Bryn Alyn through some trees.

There are a few geo-caches up here and as luck would have it one of them was hidden in an old shaft that has been mined and as we got there it started to rain so we sheltered in there until it stopped.

The hill is a Site of Special Scientific Interest and form's part of the Clwyd Range Area of Outstanding Natural  Beauty and stand's at a height of 408 metres,1,338 feet and give's you fantastic view's in all direction's.We now headed for the Limestone Pavement which is the second largest in Wales,seen here to the left of the hill with Moel Gyw to the right.

They are called limestone pavement's because they are flat and have crack's in them like a pavement,rain get's into these crack's and dissolves the limestone and form's block's which are called Clints and deep crack's are called Grikes,seen here.

Walking across to the summit we were hit by the mother of all rain shower's,it absolutely hammered down for 10 minutes and we got drenched,i wish the wet gear was in the rucksack,tool.The sun immediately came out and to be fair dried us out very quickly and we could again enjoy the view's.

The wind was a little bit keen to sit on the summit and have our break so we dropped down a couple of hundred feet and found some shelter to have a cuppa and still have a decent view.

It started to cloud over again so we made a hasty retreat and just got back to the car as it started raining again.We clocked up 3.5 miles with 1,150 feet of ascent today.


MILEAGE     148.5
ASCENT      37,550
TOPS             45.