Day 17–Friday, April 28. Whitesands Bay to Porthgain (10 miles)

A fairly smooth start to the day and George seems to be walking with more pep in his step. We had to stop and pay Pete at the car park for the camping last night. When we went up, he was talking to his friend Terry who was sitting in a car. As you might expect, we talked to them for a bit. As with every Welsh person I have met, they were friendly and helpful. They gave us more suggestions of where to eat ahead–the consensus seems to be the Sloop in Porthgain.

Porthgain a couple miles further than we are planning for today but possible. We are thinking of Abereiddy but I don’t think there’s anything there. It all depends on how George is feeling, but early indications are looking good.

Since we are going into a different area of Wales with less of a Norman influence, I feel it is necessary to introduce my followers to a little history of the area. The Normans were a very brutal people and arrogant when they invaded southern Wales. Not only were they protective of the areas they controlled, they were also very protective of the knowledge they had. Keeping that covetness of knowledge in mind, it is important to understand the stages of the Norman invasion. In the first phase, the Normans divided their alphabet into 3 separate cargoes during the invasion. Unfortunately, only the fist ship made it safely to shore (remember how rugged the Wales coast has been in the pictures we have shown). On subsequent invasions, they tried to bring the two remaining shipments of the alphabet to Wales but due to storms at sea, battles on shore, and general bad luck, it was almost 200 years before the second portion of the alphabet made it to shore.

The Welsh, not being a sedentary people, made do with what they had. The first shipment contained no vowels other than an occasional “O” and the “Y”. That’s why we end up with names like “Porthyn Hyfryd”. The Welsh decided to take their revenge on the Normans by creating names like “Cwrw” for beer knowing that a Normal would die of thirst before he could order it properly. By the time the second shipment made it 200 years later, the Welsh didn’t feel a need for it. To try to keep the Normans happy, they decided to throw a few “A” ‘s in names that already existed giving us “Carn Porth-llong” and “Tryn-llywyd”. If nothing else, the Welsh decided the Normans would NOT be able to use their maps against them if they pushed further north. Sadly, the 3rd portion of the alphabet never made it to Wale’s shores so entire portions of the alphabet are missing to this day.

All this is a very long way to say we are not capable of pronouncing very many place names where we are now hiking.

We were able to climb out to St David’s head for a look at the rugged coast and to visit the last piece of Wales we felt we could safely pronounce. As we were coming off of St David’s Head, we ran into Chuck and Betsy once again. We knew this would be the last time we would see them on the trail as they were pressing further on than us today. This morning at breakfast, I learned that Chuck was 77 years old and doing this hike. Even without carrying a pack, this is a rugged trail that will wear you down doing 10-12 miles a day.

To illustrate that point we ran into 2 brothers and their wives ranging in age from 77-82 and any one of them could have taken George out after he had walked 6 miles. They were a group of octogenarians that would show these whimpy drug gangs in downtown Chicago a thing or two. The British have a much different relationship with nature than we do. If it’s cold, we close the doors and windows and turn on the heat. If it’s hot, we close the doors and turn on the AC. If it’s cold in Wales, they open the windows and go for a brisk walk. If it’s hot…they don’t know what to do because it never gets much over 70.

The trail today was actually fairly flat staying to the cliff tops all the way up to Abereiddy where we dropped down to the beach . This is the start of the slate mining area. The climb up from the beach goes by “The Blue Lagoon” which is an old quarry right next to the sea which had been flooded and is now a popular diving spot.

George opted to continue on at this point (mainly because we didn’t have a choice), but it was easy to see that he was in pain again. We passed another beach less than a mile later with a little less than 500 steps down to the sand–I couldn’t get any takers to go down with me.

By now, the goal had changed to just make it to Porthgain for food and camping. We were all dragging a bit by the time we made it to The Sloop Inn, but they would allow us to eat inside if we agreed to be out in 45 minutes. That would easily be time for 2 pints and a dessert. Heck, we might even be able to squeeze in a plate with nutrition on it. We managed to eat and drink our fill in the time allotted.

When we came out, we started looking for a place to camp. Unfortunately, there is NOTHING in Porthgain other than 2 great pubs. We had no choice but to push on and find a wild spot. George was deathly quiet which meant I had to get out front of him or he would finish the trail tonight. When he’s tired and hurting, he turns into a walking zombie that no one can stop unless they tackle him. It was almost a mile before we found a spot level enough to set up 3 tents and still be somewhat protected from the wind. It didn’t take long to set up tents and fall asleep tonight.