Home > Articles > Wales Road Trip Day 1
29th August 2018 by Fraser
Picking a date to hold an event is normally difficult, but the seemingly endless streak of blistering hot weather we've had in the UK made it easy. It looked like no matter what day I picked to get people together for a drive, the weather would be perfect.
WRONG.
But the rain only dampened the roads. So with spirits still intact and hot coffee in our cup holders, we set off to Wales.
Our friend Chris had been offering to host us down in Wales for a drive for quite a while now, so we finally took him up on it and invited everyone we could think of with 4 wheels and a poor sense of self preservation along for 2 days of driving on what promised to be some of the best roads this part of the country had to offer, and oh boy did he deliver.
After meeting up at a McDonald's for a classy breakfast, 8 of us headed West on the A5 to meet Chris at a viewpoint on the West edge of the Evo Triangle. Coming through varying degrees of rain on the motorway and A5, we slipped and slid our way up the east edge of the triangle, only to be greeted by freezing gusts of wind upon arrival. This set the scene for the remaining two days, and no amount of rain was going to wipe the grins off our faces. We had a brief stop upon meeting Chris to complain about the weather and proclaim how slippy the roads were going to be and which one of us was going to put it into the scenery first, before continuing further east towards Porthmadog.
On mostly A-Roads it was a case of skipping our way through bank holiday traffic with a series of caravan overtakes before we came down past Snowdon where the roads tightened. We snaked our way down the narrow tarmac bordered by rock walls on either side with some close squeezes by oncoming cars thinking they required as much road space as an Aventador. It made for a fun downhill section, tiptoeing around the corners and breathing in through the gaps with the rain still pouring and the roads ever greasy.
We stopped for lunch at a pub, discussing the highlight of the morning, which was universally a section over the top of the B4391.
The afternoon consisted of a push down the west coast, before cutting inland past Tregaron towards our stop for the night. Tight single track intersected by some more open B-Road stretches made for good driving, with traffic definitely present but not as bad as expected. The jewel in the crown of the afternoon was undoubtedly a section of pristine back road just south of Pontrhydfendigaid, which shared more similarities with a roller coaster than a road. Near vertical crests with sweeping troughs, switchbacks so tight you thought you'd have to take a second swing at them, and sheer drops on the side that made you reconsider your throttle position like nothing else on the trip.
The smooth as glass tarmac meant the cars rolled along with zero effort, and you could concentrate on getting into the groove of the road, leaning into the apexes before gliding back out on the exits. Sending the cars over the crests just enough to unweight you in your seat before being squashed back into it during the compression. It was something special.
After a short meeting with 200 of the wooly locals, we unwound along some decent width B-Roads and arrived at Chris's, cracked some beers, caught up on the F1, ate an amazing spread of food he provided, and played some board games.
Bring on Monday.
