{"id":19883,"date":"2015-08-09T07:42:22","date_gmt":"2015-08-09T06:42:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.alananna.co.uk\/blog\/?p=19883"},"modified":"2015-08-09T07:46:38","modified_gmt":"2015-08-09T06:46:38","slug":"geocaching-records-on-the-kerry-ridgeway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.alananna.co.uk\/blog\/2015\/08\/geocaching-records-on-the-kerry-ridgeway\/","title":{"rendered":"Geocaching Records on the Kerry Ridgeway"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Kerry Ridgeway – I’d never really heard much about it before and had never been there, but whilst looking for a suitable series of geocaches to find it cropped up in our searches and so an adventure was planned. Once again, geocaching was about to take us to a spectacular part of the country that we had never been to before.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0Kerry Ridgeway is an ancient track that\u00a0stretches 15 miles from Cider House (south of Newtown) to Bishop’s Castle in Shropshire. According to the notice boards, it takes about 6 hours to walk and can also be followed on horseback or bicycle. We chose the latter, but were stopping every few hundred metres to find a geocache as there are a series of 47 along the trail. The Kerry Ridgeway never dips below 1000 feet above sea level, giving excellent views in all directions.<\/p>\n

\"Two<\/a>

Two Tumps Viewpoint<\/p><\/div>\n

The Cambrian Mountains are criss-crossed by countless old tracks and routeways, many of which have been abandoned and absorbed into the landscape. Some however remain intact and the Kerry Ridgeway is the most ancient of these that still remain. It’s origins are lost in the mists of time but it is certainly older than the Iron Age and Dark Age earthworks which cut its line.<\/p>\n

Our plan was to follow the trail from the beginning at Cider House and end in time for dinner in Bishop’s Castle. That obviously presented a logistical challenge related to getting back again at the end of the day. So I dropped Anna and Morgan off at Cider House and let them start the trail whilst I quickly drove across country to a place called Pantglas, about two thirds of the way along the Kerry Ridgeway where I parked the car, jumped on my bike and made a mad dash back along the ridgeway, uphill, until I met them.<\/p>\n

Anna and Morgan would be going slower than me anyway and as they were stopping for geocaches along the way would cover very little ground in comparison to what I could so I wouldn’t miss out on too much of the trail and would get a workout as I sped uphill across the ridgeway towards them. I wasn’t going that hard as my mountain bike wasn’t sounding too healthy having not been used for a while, but I was pushing on at a fair rate. I even managed to get a couple of trophies on strava segments as I tried to concentrate on the trail rather than the amazing views around me – there would be plenty of time for views on the way back.<\/p>\n