ELAN VALLEY

 And senseless were my heart, could I look back

Upon the varied way my feet have trod,
Without a silent prayer that health and joy,
And love and happiness, may long abide                          
In the romantic vale where Ellen winds.

from 'Coombe-Ellen' (Cwm Elan), a poem written by William Lisle Bowles (1798)

Where to start? The Elan Valley is incredible. It's just outside Rhayader, in Mid-Wales, and it's a series of reservoirs and dams built to provide water to Birmingham. There are 5 dams, each one different and beautiful in its own way. There is a narrow road that runs around the entire complex, and just to ride around it in silence is a joy.

The whole is 180 square kilometres, and although owned by Welsh Water, is mostly cared for by the Elan Valley Trust. Although both organisations encourage public access for recreation and environmental education, it is a sensitive area, and there are certain restrictions that should be observed, both for safety, and for protection of the wildlife. 

Caban Coch dam, next to the visitor centre. The bottom of this dam is too low to enable water to be gravity fed to Birmingham, therefore the water is extracted at the Foel Tower at Garreg Ddu 

The visitor centre has a sculpture celebrating Percy Bysshe Shelley, who used to stay in  houses (Nantgwyllt and Elan House) in 1811/1812, that have been drowned beneath the waters of one of the reservoirs. The sculpture is the work of Christopher Kelly, and was installed in 1986.

You can just make out, across the bridge, the little Nantgwyllt Church. The Corporation built this as a replacement for the original, which was submerged by the rising waters. The bridge is actually the top of a submerged dam. This is Pont Ddu - the bridge that leads across the Garreg Ddu submerged dam and (eventually) to the Claerwen Dam 

Pen Y Garreg dam

Craig Goch dam - you can drive cross this one, to a small car park at the start of some lovely walking trails

There is also the Dol y Mynach dam, which was never completed, and the remains of the Nant y Gro dam - a small dam originally built to supply water to the workers' village, and subsequently used by Barnes Wallace to test his early theory of a bouncing bomb