The Cambrian Mountains is the collective name for a vast, empty area of central Wales. It stretches for 45 miles – all the way from Snowdonia in the north southwards down to Llandovery, where the Brecon Beacons take on the upland mantel in the hilly heart of the country.
In that 45-mile journey, from Machynlleth to Llandovery, you encounter only one main road and the first shop to be seen for miles around – and only a very small one at that – is found at Rhandirmwyn. There are no petrol stations, your mobile phone won’t work and the land belongs to the animals.
As the damp westerly winds blow in from the Atlantic over this wonderful wild expanse of high, rounded hills, the natural consequence of high rainfall has been exploited by the water companies. Many large reservoirs have been built in the Elan Valley, of which Llyn Brianne is a particularly attractive example. These unnatural lakes have their detractors, but they have, without doubt, allowed much easier access to these lonely places than was previously possible and a chance for the determined to penetrate this last wilderness in southern Britain.
The very civilised Camping and Caravanning Club site at Rhandirmwyn is the perfect basecamp for what amount to almost expeditionary days out in this monumental tract of untouched countryside. The site is a level expanse situated in the bottom of the Tywi Valley, next to the river, with the big green hills rearing up on both sides. It’s a lovely place just to sit outside the tent and admire the surroundings, watching the buzzards soar on the thermals. Not that you’ll be doing much lounging about, though, not once the alternative options are pointed out to you.
Site facilities are to a very high standard, as is usual with the Camping and Caravanning Club sites, but what isn’t quite so typical is just how few folk know about this hiddenaway place. Even in the middle of summer, to find this site anywhere near full would certainly be a surprise.
This is a very salubrious site in every way, but what it offers, more than anything else, is a gateway to the kind of wild and empty places that seem to be completely alien to the hustle and bustle of modern life, but that most of us feel an instinctive need to communicate with. And the most obvious thing it communicates, in its own natural way, is ‘leave your mobile behind’.
