Cardiff

LAST DAY on the road. Approx. 60 miles was waiting for me to complete my charity cycle. The fundraising was a very good motivation on the hard days, but the thought that this was the finish run, that today I would see my girlfriend and my friends who supported me all the time gave me an extra push to GO GO GO.
I am going to miss my Welsh discovery days, but I think ten days is just on the boundary between a long trip and a lifestyle. As I knew that I wouldn't stay on the road for months or years, for me that was the perfect amount of time to spend exploring the unknown and spreading Ty Hafan's message.

Between Llanelli to Swansea was a beautiful park. The cycle path was under the shade of trees touching above the road. Then a nice ride alongside the the sunny Swansea beach, and then... I thought I was back in the polluted part of Pančevo, Serbia. The cycle path led me through the industrial zone of Port Talbot, following the main road from roundabout to another. The first time that Route 4 left the main road, it went into the wild. The nice Margam Park is really worth a visit, but it didn't suit me either because it only had dirt roads, and as it slowed me down quite a lot, I decided to leave the National Cycling Route. I was too excited to get back to Cardiff, so I just got onto the main A48 road, and finished the last 25 miles of my 9 day long cycling trip in a sprint back to the city. Because of my need for speed I didn't stop to take any pictures, but to be honest that last chunk didn't have any new landscapes for me.
In Cardiff I got a welcoming applause from my housemates, and with that warm welcome my 9 days cycling +1 day resting trip around Wales came to its end. The time has come to lay back and open a beer.

Llanelli

After my trauma from the stormy day from Felinwynt to Solva I followed Route 4 and the main road. As I cut off approx. 15 miles from that day I had to be smart about the 9th (8th cycling) day's distance. The only thing I knew was that I didn't want main roads any more. Route 4 was there for me, but that goes around the coast, so that would have been around 80+ miles for that day - which I didn't want.

I found an alternative option which came to around 70 miles in total to Llanelli. A challenging one.

I had to cycle through about 10 villages on very regional roads. As I expected there were barely any road signs, or if there were, then my map didn't show those villages, and there were literally zero pedestrians/cyclists on the streets to help me guess the direction.

As a Welsh person would say: no worries, happy days. I've dealt with back-roads earlier in my pedal-life. The time had come to pump up my navigation skills, zoom in to all the turns on my map, make it through the farmland and rejoin Route 4 at St Claire. And I made it!

The way to Llanelli wasn't particularly interesting, expect for the shock at seeing kids playing football and other games on urban streets. I thought that activity had died out.  

After an old school 9 hours cycling, I navigated to the right house where my host, Sue, was waiting for me. She's reeeeally into maps. She has a shelf full with old, new, walking, cycling, city, every kind of map. We covered the whole living room with them and repeated, "it's amazing, it's amazing"... Then suddenly I realised that tomorrow was my last cycling day, the day when I get back to my place. So, I immediately closed the maps, and went to bed. I needed a big sleep after the tiring day to recharge my batteries for the finish ride.

Solva

After two days without sunshine, the brightness woke me up on the 8th day of my trip. Being a bit scared of the seaside wind, I reduced the day's miles and added them on to the next one, which will be hopefully easier with the wind behind me.

It seems that I was wrong about the coastal weather, as I got to St. Davids at in 4 hours.
Solva, the place where Tom, a Couchsurfer, was waiting for me was the next village from here. After I finished my sunbathing at the side of Britain's smallest city's biggest ruin, I turned towards Cardiff. Tom showed me his 'private' beach and some nice (in the world's top 10) footpaths nearby.
The coast is amazing here, but I couldn't take any nice pictures. I think I'm losing the power of taking pictures of my trip. So sorry about the decreasing quality of my shots, I hope there is still a good one per day that you like. If there aren't any, then I can recommend these places to you, so you can see their beauty with your own eyes. These cliffs will probably be around for another few decades. 

Short ride, short post, and some pictures from Felinwynt to St. Davids:

Penmon+Snowdon

Day 1 - backwind; day 2&3 - fighting the wind; day 4 - no wind. Suspicious. 

Skipped Holyhead, but still wanted to get to the edge of the mainland to take my 'end of the land' photo, and because I have a childish penchant for bridges and lighthouses. So, I've chosen Penmon  as my end-point of Wales.

After discussing Tito, Milosevic, Yugoslavia, Austro-Hungarian Empire and all the good old questions in the last few days, I was wondering where my Yugo nostalgia was coming from. How do I have one at all?
When the smell of the sea hit my face as I cycled along the coastline, a memory came back, clear as playing a tape back. My godparents once took me to Brela, a village on the Croatian  seaside - that's the bluest water I've ever seen. I think when I stayed there with them (a mix of ex-yu adults) that was a magical feeling, seeing their common memories, even though we were in international company. I think, to me, Yugoslavia means a very nice blue, the integrity of the strongest language boundaries, and holidays with whipped cream on the top - which I could have everyday for brunch. What brought all this to mind was the funny smell of the dead seashells.

Magic! There is a saying in Hungarian: every piece of magic lasts for three days. True. After three days without rain (lasting longer than 10 minutes, at least), I got it all on the fourth. Because of that, my day was cut short by 10 miles. I couldn't make it up to Snowdon. :(
BUT, luckily my very kind host Annie saw that sad smiley, and offered me a ride up to the top.

I've named this day my luxury day: bridge, lighthouse, car-ride, reggae music, huge dinner, live music - where the band dedicated one of their songs to my charity cycle, and listening to looooooots of Welsh talk (I didn't hear any English, except when they were talking to me). Beautiful language -  hopefully gonna have enough rain not to dry out these green valleys.  

Caernarfon

After resting my knee a bit, I was ready to continue my journey to Caernarfon. Before leaving Machynlleth, Alan, the guy who hosted me, showed me around the town. He took me to his workplace, a secret garden hidden in the forest few miles away. It was a laboratory for experimenting with alternative energy sources. As it was raining I couldn't take any pictures (but you can always google it).

I said goodbye to him, set off on my bike, and with the wind behind me I started my third day on the road around midday. Even though I was a bit later than my planned start, I was sure that with the help of the wind I would succeed...

The wind blew me to the foot of the next hill. After around half an hour pushing my bike up, I got up to the top of it, in the middle of the farmland. As I had already uploaded loads of photos of sheep, I was starting to feel quite overdosed with their monotone BAAAA echoing in my ears everyday. (As a footnote, I just want to say I have nothing against sheep or any farm animal, but as they completely replaced the human company after I left Brecon, I just wanted some change.)

I decided to continue on the main road. Surprisingly, that was empty as well. There were just a few cars passing by every few minutes. Even though I was happy with the speed I could keep constantly, I thought, 'it's boring here, let's go back to the woods for a while,' as I knew that I would go back to the main road for the last chunk of the daily distance.

There was a nice walk/cycle path around a lake. According to the map I needed to follow that half way through and then turn left... I was looking for the left turn, and looking, and looking, until I'd gone around the whole lake, and got back to the same point even before I'd left the route. I wasn't happy.
Enough of dirt roads, and super-remote uncyclable cycle lanes. Ignoring the the lovely little Route 8 and 82 signs I stayed on the roads all the way to Caernarfon. Managing my extra 10 miles again, I was on the road for about 7 hours, which is a lot less than the second day's 10 hrs. From the next day I will definitely combine A and B roads with the woodland labyrinths.

Caernarfon is a beautiful city with a beautiful main square - pictures to come in the next post. As my knee hasn't got better today (I'm writing this on the fourth morning) I'm looking for a support for it to prevent future uphill "screaming like a horse" effects. Another change, thanks to Jon's (my first host's) advice is that I will skip Holyhead, and head to Snowdon instead. I am staying at the same place for two days, so hopefully will manage the highest hills in Wales with less pushing as I'm not carrying all my luggage today.

Wish me luck, and here is a little illustration of my third day for you:

The last picture is of Caernarfon's main square, which I've just taken while having a rain break & cafe blogging stop. 

THE PLAN

Empty keyring - I don't need a room anymore - just the road!

Cymru Cycle starts on Monday, the 5th of May.
Here's THE PLAN:

Day 1

  Cardiff - Brecon (50 miles / 80,4 kilometres)

Day 2

  Brecon - Machynlleth (72,8 miles / 117 kilometres)

Day 3

  Machynlleth - Caernarfon (60,8 miles / 97,8 kilometres)

Day 4

  Caernarfon - Holyhead - Caernarfon ( 66,1 / 106 kilometres)

Day 5

  Caernarfon - Machynlleth (72,8 miles / 117 kilometres)

Day 6

  Machynlleth - Felinwynt (53,9 miles / 86,7 kilometres )

Day 7

  Felinwynt - St. David's - Haverfordwest (60,3 miles / 97,1 kilometres)

Day 8

  Haverfordwest - Llanelli (51,2 miles / 82,4 kilometres)

Day 9

  Llanelli - Cardiff (60,9 miles / 98 kilometres)

+ one wild card rest-day when I want (or need!!!) one.

At the Rocky statue in Žitište, Serbia on a cycle tour in 2011

After receiving lots of good luck wishes from family and friends, and getting amazing support and sponsorship from my workplace, Café Junior, the time had come to say thanks to all of them, and to my very special Hannah and her family for their kindness (especially for lending me a bicycle - quite an important part of the trip). 

Your help will be a very good downwind up the hills!

I'll keep you updated from the valleys!

Tandem

traffic jam in Romania (2007)

In a previous post I mentioned  The Bards of Wales by János Arany which is all the knowledge that Hungarian kids have of the country. Using my travels and this blog in tandem, I've found a goal which is as important as my fundraising. I would like to give a little more information, on top of the bard poem, to anyone who doesn't know much about Wales. 
This region really deserves to be part of a wider international discussion, as a secret corner of the islands of Europe.
Besides this blog I have published a few comments about my impressions of the British world in Képes Ifjúság, a youth magazine based in Serbia, and will report on the trip and the (so far really positive) experience of fundraising in Press Szó, an online magazine for young journalists.

There is a fellow cyclist from my home town, I just call him Spiritleader. 

He and I didn't have many chances to cycle together, but when we did manage to hit the road, it was always like being in a very bright dream, pedalling away from reality into the haze.

illustration by EdE Sinkovics

As he wanted to join me this time, too, I'm  inviting him here on my blog for a tandem cycle with his blog, the site of his latest book, Cycling with Zoli the Turk!

Road signs = cultural maps

My first day in Wales started with a culture-shock - or an uncultured-shock, more like. 

Not that there is no culture in Wales, but I didn't know, there is an ancient language called Welsh until I got there. I thought all the road signs with lots of LLs, DDs, Ys and Ws are probably normal here and they are weird for me just as the Serbian Cyrillic would be for a British person. Then I realized that one half of the sign was always clear; most of the Ys and Ws were all on the unclear half - the Welsh version.

This old Celtic language is not in a dying state but as a small language it really needs the attention. Being able to read it everywhere on the streets with an instant English translation under (or above) is a very cool way of promoting the Welsh culture.

I would always get excited about multilingual signs wherever I saw one.

In the region (Vajdaság/Vojvodina) where I am from most of the towns have multiple names. There, you see an everyday usage of road signs that I haven't seen in Wales yet; people post "messages" about either national, political or love conflicts through traffic signs.

These (love-)vandalised signs still communicate with travellers - in their own way.

Another case in point: I once heard from fellow travellers how shocked they had been at the Russians' pride(?) in their own alphabet, putting out signs only in Cyrillic.

All these signs are brilliant, how they always lead us somewhere...

Road sign photography

I was always passionate about damaged, funny/funny-by-mistake road signs and until a few weeks ago I'd totally forgotten that my phone has a camera.

The time had come to pay my debts and take pictures of all the road-"sirens" of Wales calling me with just one click from my saddle.

The first ever (failed) selfie...

THE CAUSE

A very economical, ecological tourist guide...

Alright, the last two aren't actually funny, but all the super-Celtic "subtitles" looked so exotic, that I just couldn't miss them.

First ride

As Easter was always the third most important spring holiday for me - it was in the shadow of my name-day (19 March) and the amazing post-communist 1st of May celebration - I decided to do a bike ride, publish the first post of this blog, watch some Family Guy and wish happy Easter when it was all done.

Looking up the possible routes for cycle training in the surroundings of Cardiff, the combination of Sultan the Pit Pony and Caerphilly Castle turned out to be perfect for an Easter ride.

There is a very rich network of cycling roads in Wales and they're all available on Sustrans' website.

Routes 8 and 4 are the ones to look out for to get to the "Leaning Tower" of Caerphilly and to Sultan, the largest pony in Europe. Even if you are infallible with maps, you can never plan over 50 kilometres - the weather can always surprise you. Our's was over 50 kilometres.

leaning like a tower

and leaning like a tower

So, we had some wrong turns as well as some thunder and lightning. We couldn't make it to the land-pony, but it was still worth it as that was Hannah's first cycling holiday and she is already looking for an upgraded bike for her next ones.

Fundraising for Tŷ Hafan

the plan of my rolling

A blog was kind of originally in my plans to extend the tour with some notes, pictures, comment, whatever, but later on I decided to add an other layer to this whole story. 

I've read about many cycling, running and climbing events for charity. As a guy growing up in Serbia, this "doing something good while on holiday" was an unknown gesture for me, but it sounded very positive, similar to voluntary work but not quite the same... I thought the only way to really understand it is to try it. 

To show my thanks for this very welcoming environment in Cardiff and for the people around Wales who offered a place to stay during the coming ten days long adventure I want to support Tŷ Hafan as a local, Wales based charity.

About the charity:

Tŷ Hafan is the charity I want to help with my sponsored cycle. They offer comfort, care and support to life-limited children, young people and their families, helping them make the most of the time they have left together. 

Tŷ Hafan is not part of the health service and in 2012-13 received just under 4% statutory funding towards more than £3.5 million needed and to continue to offer its unique service to families, it relies on the generosity of the public, its corporate sponsors and volunteers. 

I was working in Café Junior, a family-friendly café during my staying in Cardiff. Besides the café's menu the most I could learn there is the importance of the love in the family and the children's need of their parents' care every minute. I couldn't imagine a cause that is closer to my experience in Cardiff. I would like to give as much as I've received from this society before I leave.

Here is my justgiving page where you can sponsor my round-trip in Wales.

https://www.justgiving.com/jozsefracz

About me:

My name is József Rácz - in Hungarian the surname goes first, so it is actually Rácz József, but I am used to having more versions of my name as I was born in Yugoslavia - three years before it fall apart, so I have a Serbian version of my name as well. Every time I introduce myself, this Serbo-Hungarian identity question takes up the most time and I still don't have a short version of it, so I am just going to skip it now!

As a cyclist I have been to most of Serbia's neighbouring countries with an organized cycling tour group, Tour de Délvidék. These events were always fun, almost party-time, for me cycling and relaxing with lots of friends - during the years most of my folks bought a bike and joined the team. This trip will be my first longer solo pedalling.

I never took cycling too seriously, like doing it as a sport, race or a super-healthy lifestyle, but it became my favorite hobby, and then an everyday thing, the main transportation in my life. For me cycling means freedom, either from a city bus or from a stinky tourist bus and not just from buses but cycling gives me that freedom-feeling that you just can't explain through any bus metaphor.

Every Hungarian kid has heard about Wales through a very famous (required reading) lay poem, The Bards of Wales by János Arany.

Last year at the time of my usual cycling tour I moved to Wales for a few months, but it ended up lasting almost a year. Now, before I leave this place I want to look/cycle around this region.