The Outer Ring

I haven't quite fulfilled my original intentions of writing up all the lockdown walks - but here, at last, is the Outer Ring, which we have done a few times.  As the name implies, this is outside the Inner Ring, generally skirting the Bangor boundary (but with the odd scenic diversion). It's a total of about 10 miles, or 11 if you add in walking along the pier - which we did for the map.

It doesn't have to be done as a whole: there are opportunities to switch to the Inner Ring, or to Lon Adda, for a shorter walk. And of course as a circular walk you can start and finish anywhere you like, although the route description is given from Aber Adda, where both the Inner Ring and Lon Adda intersect with it.

Route Description: start and finish Aber Adda

Leave Aber Adda behind the Crosville Club building and follow Wales Coastal Path signs through modern houses then a short lane, and join the road towards the Tap & Spile. Turn left up the hill then right, still following Wales Coast Path signs.

Bangor Pier can be accessed here and provides an optional extra walk. Refreshment pavilions along the side and at the end offer drinks, cakes and snacks.

Where a lane forks off downwards towards the beach, the Coast Path allows this as a low tide alternative; the same is possible for this route, in which case follow the lane and continue along the beach. Otherwise, continue along the road as far as Ffordd Gorad/Gorad Road, where the Coast Path turns right and continue to follow these signs which takes you down to the beach at Gorad-y-Gut, joining up with the low tide alternative route.

Pass though a kissing gate, still following Coast Path signs, behind a house. After ascending through a field, you are faced with a choice of two kissing gates, black metal to the left and wooden to the right, in the corner of the field. either route is possible. The wooden gate leads into the Nantporth Nature Reserve, trees and a former limestone quarry just above the shoreline; the path here can be muddy and involves steep steps. The black gate leads to an alternative route introduced in 2020, which follows field boundaries (but with the occasional tripping hazard from protruding roots). The alternatives join up and pass football grounds, then continue to follow Coast Path signs along the A5 and, at the bridge, into Treborth grounds.

Just before the botanical gardens,  the Coast Path leaves the roadway (pictured) towards the shoreline, in Treborth. Follow this path parallel to the Menai Strait until you pass below the Britannia Bridge, which carries both the A55 and the railway. At this point, the Outer Ring leaves the Coast Path, following a concrete track up hill, passing under the bridge again, joining a tarmac lane. Continue along this lane until, just before houses at Treborth village, there is a stile on the left hand side. Cross the stile and take the path (through a short wet area) along the right-hand field boundary. This path to some extent is doubling-back on the road just walked, but eventually you encounter a stile going up over a stone wall to the right,  and follow this. Follow the track through a small wood, across a field, then over a stile and the remains of a kissing gate, joining a track where you turn right. 

Follow this track until it reaches the A487. Cross the road carefully, then follow a path which continues opposite, past the side of the 'Old Drovers'. Continue upwards towards the roundabout in front of Ysbyty Gwynedd. Cross to the left of the roundabout then follow the track (not signposted) after the first building on the other side of the road (pictured). Continue along this bridleway as it winds steeply downhill towards the Tesco roundabaout. Cross to the left of the roundabout, passing to the left of the Tesco building. Continue up this road a short distance, leaving Evolution Bikes on your left, the turn left up a track following a public footpath sign. Continue until, just a after a range of former farm outbuildings, a footpath sign continues forward (where the track turns left), passing through a kissing gate. Follow this path uphill through fields until it emerges onto a lane, where you turn left and walk on the road towards Minffordd. Soon the road reaches an tarmac access on the left were opposite foopath is indicated through a kissing gate (also an opportunity here to switch to the Inner Ring). Turn right to take the footpath along the right-hand field boundary.

The next field is narrow, and the path not well-defined: do not continue to the end of the field, but instead aim for a gate in the left-hand side, partly hidden by thorns, gorse and ivy (pictured). Through this gate follow initally a worn track through gorse, but where the track forks right downwards, continue straight on until reaching a kissing gate confirms you are still on the right path.  Follow a level course across the middle of the next field until you see the next gate. In the field which follows, the path initially passes round the edge of a wooded hill sloping down to the right, then continues donwards towards an electricity pylon and a gate to the road. 

There are scenic views of Snowdonia, the Great Orme and towards Penrhyn Castle here. 

Reaching this road, turn left uphill, then right, steeply downhill towards the ford and footbridge over Afon Cegin. Immediately after the ford, leave the road to the right to join Lon Las Ogwen, turning sharp left here to duck under the road bridge and walk down towards Port Penrhyn. At Port Penrhyn, resume following Coast Path signs towards Aber Adda, the start and end point.

Social Distancing Etiquette

When I was a lad, and you went for a walk in the countryside, everybody you passed said hello or something, because that's what they did in the country, but it wasn't so common in urban areas. That generally lapsed. More recently, when doing longer walks away from home, such as when we walked the Thames Path, we tried to be friendly to people we encountered, especially in the countryside. We began to notice that it was other long-distance (or otherwise holidaying) walkers - as distinguished by clothes, rucksacks etc. - who would say something. Dog-walkers and other locals to the area were less likely to respond. Country people no longer said hello at passers.

Social distancing has introduced a whole new etiquette of politeness. When we meet somebody, both sides make efforts to maintain our two metre separation, and saying hello to strangers has become common once again. Why? First, because we're all in lockdown so it's more sympathetic to say something to people when this may be their only interaction all day. Second, it's like an apology for giving them a wide berth - I'm staying away from you because we have to, but not because I want to avoid you.

We've noticed another convention in this social distancing etiquette, which we started doing ourselves, but noticed others are doing it, too. When approaching people on a pavement which is too narrow to social distance on the pavement, it is those facing oncoming traffic who step into the road. Common sense really.

The Inner Ring

On Sunday we walked the Inner Ring, a walk of seven miles. The Inner Ring is mostly just inside the boundary of the City of Bangor, passing outside it briefly between Bryn Llwyd and Minffordd. Our start and finish wasn't actually at Aber Adda as I've planned the routes, but for a circular walk, that doesn't really matter.



In the current circumstances, this was our daily exercise and we would have been social distancing all the way, except that we met very few people. We had lovely weather, and observed it's nice at this time of year when spring flowers are out, but trees don't yet have enough leaf cover to obscure views either side of the path. There were places that might have been muddy underfoot but weren't because it has been dry for so long.








Route Description: start and finish Aber Adda 

Garth Hill

Leave Aber Adda behind the Crosville Club building, following Coastal Footpath signs at first, but turn left after a house numbered 57, then at the end of a short length of road, follow an alleyway to the right of number 34-38. Cross the road passing a short distance to the left, and at the sign for the Community Centre, ascend the steep Garth Hill. At the top of the hill, cross the road and continue up a path into woodland (at sign which marks this Entry 1). Keep to the right where the path forks in the wood, emerging eventually onto a grassy area with three benches facing the Menai Strait.

This open land is known as ‘Roman Camp’, although it is neither Roman nor a camp, but with signs of a medieval field system. From the benches, there are views to the left of Menai Suspension Bridge and Britannia Bridge, with the Marquess of Anglesey’s column visible against the horizon. To the right, the view extends to the west end of Beaumaris, with Puffin Island behind, and Bangor Pier in the foreground.  It is worth ascending to the summit of Roman Camp on the field behind the benches, where some of the city is seen in the valley below, with a vista of Snowdonia beyond.

'Roman Camp'

From the benches, go towards the direction of the bridges, staying on the Menai Strait side of the field, where a muddy path dives down through woodland. Follow this down, emerging through a limestone arch onto a lane (Entry 4). Turn left and after a short distance right into a field to follow a path parallel to the road.

These are Ashley Jones’s fields. The circle of stones on the right were erected for the 1971 National Eisteddfod, held in Bangor.

Continue round a semi-circular parking bay to the end of the fields, then emerge back on Siliwen Road and follow this uphill. Continue to the right where it joins with Holyhead Road (A5), crossing at the first traffic island, then carry on past a bus stop, until a path enters Menai Woods to the left. The main path takes you through the woods, with the traffic of the A5 never far away. Where it emerges at the other end cross over the road at the traffic island. Continue along the A5 on the right-hand pavement, crossing over just after a set of iron gates to join the path on the other side of the road (if traffic is too heavy for this crossing, continue on the right-hand side as far as the roundabout.) At the roundabout follow Treborth Road uphill on the left-hand side as far as a footpath on the left near a house called Cae Ffos.

Brewery chimney

Follow the path which runs uphill following the course of a stream on the right. As the path emerges from woodland, pass right into the next field, still following the course of the stream, until emerging through two gates onto a tarmac lane.

The open land here is Brewery Fields, once owned by a local brewery, now a nature reserve. The route here follows just one of many paths in this popular area of open land, which are indicated on information boards nearby. As the path leaves the fields, the ivy-covered tall brick chimney is all that remains of the brewery today.

Turn right along Penrhos Road and continue this way as far as Bron Y De. Avoid any temptation to turn into Blaen y Wawr or Lon y Bedw, but where Bron y De appears to be leading to a dead end straight ahead, follow the road right past a school building until it joins Ffordd Coed Mawr, and turn right, down the hill. At the lowest point, the road crosses river Adda in its culvert below, and here is the interchange with Lôn Adda, which goes off to the left down Bryn Llwyd Bungalows. Continue along Ffordd Coed Mawr the short distance to cross Caernarfon Road at either traffic island.

The Inner Ring now continues up the lane on the opposite site of the roundabout to Ffordd Coed Mawr, swinging initially to the left, then with a hairpin bend to the right as it ascends.  Pass the entrance to Bwthyn y Coed on the right, and waterworks on the left, until reaching Bryn Llwyd (name not marked), a house on the right with some old outbuildings to the left of the path. Here the path goes half-left over a grassy knoll, through an old gateway and leftwards through a scrubby, and potentially muddy, field. After crossing a recently-rebuilt bridge over a stream, go through a kissing gate. Follow the path round a hillock then leftwards along the field boundary to another gate. In the next field, go straight on and up through a small wooded area to the next gate. Here, the footpath soon joins an access track at Perfeddgoed Bach. As you continue along this path, the peaks of Yr Elen and Carnedd Llewelyn come into view straight ahead.

As the access track joins a road, turn left here to follow the road. Ignore a farm access track to the right and continue along the road for nearly a mile through the hamlet of Minffordd. This comes to a T-junction near a humming transformer, where we turn right, following the signpost for Glasinfryn.

View near Minffordd

The road passes the site of former Minffordd Hospital (now demolished) to the left. This was built by Bangor City Council in 1895 as an isolation hospital after a typhoid epidemic in the city. Within the NHS system it became an eye hospital and later a community hospital before closing in 2009. At the next T-junction is a fine unobscured view of Snowdonia, provided you can ignore the industrial estate in front of you. To the left is the Great Orme, then Penmaenmawr with Penrhyn Castle immediately in front. Mostly we see the Carneddau range, with the view to the right taking in Elidir Fawr [and Snowdon beyond?].

Take the left road at the T-junction then after a small wooded area, take the footpath to the right. At the end of the field, this crosses a rough track – the Bishop’s Mill Road, apparently still part of the road network according to maps – where the path continues the other side. Follow this path until it reaches the side of Ysgol Glan Cegin, then follow road footways round the front of the school before rejoining a path behind a row of houses.  The path joins the access lane to the Golf Club, runs downhill and emerges to cross a bridge over the old line of road to the arch of the former Penrhyn Arms hotel. Turn left at the arch.

The portico of the former Penrhyn Arms

As is recorded on the arch, the Penrhyn Arms Hotel stood here from 1799, then from 1884 became the home of the University College of North Wales. The college did not vacate the building until 1926, the building - apart from this arch - was demolished to make way for the present-day A5 beyond. The layout of what had been the Hotel’s gardens are still evident in the public park the other side of the main road. 

Follow steps ahead of the arch, then cross the A5. Continue on the right hand footway, following Coastal Path signs, to reach Aber Adda.

  

  

What this is about

Many years ago, inspired by the example of waymarked circular walks such as London's Capital Ring, I began to wonder whether my home city of Bangor should have something similar. I began to plan the Bangor Ring walks, which grew to three concentric rings, with Lôn Adda running through the middle. I was going to write it up, but somehow lost interest, among competing other projects, and the idea got nowhere.

Now, facing lockdown and social distancing, and with the one daily chance to exercise close to home, this is the time to dust off those designs and look again at the Bangor Ring walks, as we walk these , and parts of these, during our daily exercise.

I will go into more detail on these later when I have re-walked some and firmed up on the routes, but here is a quick summary. A circular walk can of course be joined anywhere, but these walks have a nominal start and finish point at Aber Adda: the car park near the mouth of the Adda (by Crosville Club), where they also join up with Lôn Adda. Obviously they can be walked in either direction, but I tend to think of them as anticlockwise walks. The 'Outer Ring' is designed to follow approximately the outer boundaries of the City of Bangor, but extends beyond them for a better walk, and is about ten miles. The 'Inner Ring' is just inside the Outer Ring, but still mostly outside the built-up area, and is about seven miles. There was also going to be a 'City Ring', mostly a walk of the City centre, but I didn't get round to planning that one in detail, and maybe this will be the time to do so. There were going to be pushchair-friendly variants, too. More details will follow.

This blog isn't just going to cover the Ring Walks, but will also document something of the experience of more intensely walking around Bangor, and observations.