I met someone from Devon recently who was unhappy about the Brecon Beacons National Park changing its name to Bannau Brycheiniog. She resented the alteration because the English was – well, English –and because the new/old version was yet another example (she said) of the “uppity attitude” of modern day Wales. Here in Morgannwg we have an uppity attitude because most settlements are in the valleys and to travel in any direction other than south you have to go up and over the nearest mountain. My walk last Sunday started from Blackmill with a very steep climb up some steps that had been cut into the hillside; so steep, in fact, that I needed a couple of minutes at the top to get my breath back and make sure that my legs weren’t serious about their threat to go into spasms of cramp. And that made me think about how rambling can be a perilous pastime.
I got my love of walking and maps from my dad. Every winter we would head up onto the moors near Brecon to look for snow (for me) and to stop for a fried breakfast at the Mountains Café (for him). Eventually I reached the stage where I wanted to walk further and alone so snow and fried breakfast expeditions with Dad became just another happy memory. A few years ago (and – excuse alert – before I had started to learn Welsh) I decided to do a long distance challenge walk in the Cambrian Mountains. Anticipating that I wouldn’t feel like driving home after a 30 mile yomp, I persuaded my sister to take me. She intended to have a lazy day mooching around the shops and tearooms of Llanwrtyd Wells. It was the middle of summer, the weather was perfect and the route was gorgeous. Even so 30 miles is 30 miles and by the time I got back to Walk HQ, my legs were screaming.
“Glad you’re back safe,” said the event organiser as I booked in. “Your sister’s had an accident. She’s broken her foot. She dropped an industrial typewriter on it. She’s waiting for you by the river.”
It didn’t take long to find Annie because she was the only person sitting in the river rather than by it.
“I broke my foot,” she announced. “Do you have any idea how heavy industrial typewriters are?”
“I do actually,” I said. “How did it fall on your foot?”
“Because some patronising blokes at the auction offered to carry it to the car for me. I said to them, I said – I’m an orthopaedic nurse. I lift patients twice as heavy as this without help. So to prove it, I picked up the typewriter and took it to the car but I when I went to put it in the boot, it slipped sideways and then it fell. My foot was underneath. I can’t drive you know. You’re going to have to take us home.”
There was, at this point, a choice of questions: which blokes? What auction? Why bid for a typewriter at all, let alone an industrial one? In the end I asked why she was sitting in the river.
“Because my foot is broken and the cold water will stop the swelling.”
“Yes, but you’re sitting down in the river.”
“I couldn’t stand. Like I said, my foot is …”
“Broken. I know. Is it though? Really?”
“It feels like. I haven’t taken my shoe off in case my toes have been traumatically amputated and they float away downstream. Anyway, help me up. I want to go home.”
And so it was that we started the drive back down the A470. After about an hour with the heater on full blast and the windows wide open to prevent steam forming, most of Annie’s trousers had dried off. By this time we were both hungry so stopped at the Mountains Cafe which had now changed its name to Cartref Mynyddoedd. When we got out of the car it became clear that only the front and legs of Annie’s trousers had dried – her backside was still (literally) dripping wet. My body, meanwhile, had developed a post 30 mile walk rigor: knees refused to bend and hips had seized up completely. We were a bit of a sight as we crossed the car park. Each of my legs took it in turn to swing forward in an ungainly arc with me unable to stop myself from yelping as blistered feet hit the ground; Annie had one hand on my shoulder to balance herself as the broken foot refused to cooperate in any form of weight bearing. Every time we paused, a little bit of the river Irfon puddled to mark the spot. We staggered and squelched into the café which was surprisingly full for 6 o’clock on a Sunday evening. We spotted an empty table on the far side of the room. With a lot of excusing and apologising, we pushed and manhandled our way past seated diners until we collapsed into chairs making loud and unselfconscious grunts of pain.
A waitress arrived.
“Can I help you?”
“Have you got a menu?” said Annie. “No, forget that. I’ll have anything with chips: sausage, peas and chips but without peas or ham, egg and chips but without an egg.”
“Are you a resident?” said the waitress.
“No.”
“Then I’m sorry but you can’t eat here. We’re not a café, you know.”
“Yes, you are,” I said taking on the know-it-all persona that I am renowned for. “I used to come here with my dad. He always had fried breakfast.”
“That would have been a few years ago then. Before we became Cartref Mynyddoedd Nursing Home.”
I glanced around. We were being stared at by a roomful of open mouthed octogenarians. I wish we could say that we made a discreet and dignified exit but alas, that was beyond us and particularly it was beyond Annie, who stopped at several tables to tell people about her broken foot and the dangers of buying industrial typewriters at auctions in Llanwrtyd Wells .
Epilogue.
1 I spend a lot of my days driving up and down the A470 and never a trip to Brecon goes by without me feeling a little twang of nostalgia/embarrassment/shame as I go past Cartref Mynyddoedd.
2 Annie had bought the industrial typewriter as a present for me because she had remembered me saying something about a typewriter a couple of weeks earlier.
3 The something I had said was “I’ve bought a Word Processer and given my old typewriter to a charity shop.”
4 Annie gave the industrial typewriter to someone she knew who sold it in a car boot sale for 50p.
5 Wales is a bilingual nation. The sooner you learn a bit of the language, the better. Let me help you out: Café – Caffi ; Home – Cartref.
