We normally go on a family walk sometime between Christmas and New Year. We're not all together at Christmas or New Year, so coming together, albeit briefly sometime in the intervening days is a great chance to catch up, get some fresh air and walk off some of the yuletide excesses.
Wit ages ranging between 8 and 70, we don't go far, and several times over the last few years we've done a circular walk around Cardiff Bay. It's ideal - at 4 miles it's far enough to make it a worthwhile walk without overkill. It's flat. It's not muddy (pretty much all paved, and certainly all paths), and there are a multitude of refreshment points half way round at Mermaid Quay. We've been blessed with some decent weather in previous years, but this year 27th December dawned gloomy and damp.
We started as normal from the free car park off Marconi Way in Penarth Marina Park and headed in a clockwise direction over the Ely via the Pony y Werin bridge.
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| River Ely from Pont y Werin bridge |
From there we walked down past the ice rink and onto the boardwalk. The misty gloom contributed to an atmospheric picture as sailing boats in the bay slowly appeared out of the mist, one boat standing out due to its luminous sail.
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| Sailing boats in the bay |
From the relative peacefulness of the boardwalk, we moved onto the road bridge carrying the A4232 over the Taff. Always busy and noisy, this part of the walk normally provides some great photo opportunities of the bay, but the fog played havoc with that. All we could see was one water bus coming down the Taff into the bay. In one corner near Cardiff Yacht Club, various detritus had gathered, having floated down the Taff and Ely rivers into the bay. It was fascinating, and though somewhat sad to see at least a dozen footballs in that single area that probably once gave so much fun to someone. On the plus side, it gave me a chance to post the photo to the Twitter account @lostfootballs!
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| Lost Footballs |
Escaping the roar of road noise, we took the path into the Cardiff Wetlands reserve, heading towards the St Davids hotel, with a quick detour down the boardwalk to get closer to the various swans, dusk's, coots, grebes and other associated waterfowl that call the bay their home.
From St Davids hotel we wandered into Mermaid Quay, and met up with some more family in the Wetherspoon's Mount Stuart for some much needed refreshments!
Once fed and watered (ok, alright, beered), we walked past the rest of Mermaid Quay, the magnificent Pierhead building, the Send and Norwegian Church, before making our way past the vast empty space that until recently housed the Dr Who exhibition. On the way, it was a fantastic opportunity to take some really atmospheric snaps that the misty weather enabled of the old moorings, and various boats coming out of, or disappearing into the mist.
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| Old moorings |
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| Water taxi disappearing into the gloom |
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| Boat coming into moor |
The disappearance of the Dr Who exhibition allowed for a nice reflection shot in a puddle on the concrete.
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Refelections
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From here we wound past the old disused locks, and onto the barrage proper. The tide was way out - as low as I've ever seen it, showing the mud flats and the deep channel into the still working port. The by now dry, if not clear day, had clearly got people out and about from their cosy homes to walk off the Christmas calories and the barrage was pretty busy. The mist was so bad, that you couldn't see Penarth Head, only the first couple of floors of St Davids hotel were visible, and the tops of the flats alongside the A4232 and across towards the Cogan spur were all but invisible.
The sea locks at the Penarth end of the barrage are always a fascinating site to behold. The deep locks, the creaks and the rushing of water over the fish ladders. The little pink shack on the end of the harbour wall was just visible with the guiding lights shining out of the mist, and as is usual, I didn't pass up the opportunity to stand on the spot that gave me the perfect shot of the concentric circles where they all come together.
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| Harbour entrance wall and guiding lights |
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| Circle Art |
Almost at our walks end we crossed into Penarth Marina, across the bridge and back alongside the river Ely before returning to the car park.
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| Penarth Marina |
We've done this walk many times. Usually in dryer, bright conditions. However, the walk today gave an opportunity to see (or not see) the bay in a completely different light (quite literally), but it was no less interesting for that, and some of the photos I took I was really please with, as it provided a unique atmosphere to the shots.
It's a great walk whichever way round you do it. A decent guide can be found from Derek Brockway's "Weatherman Walking" website.
The PDF of the walk is available here.
