Waun Rydd Hike - GW/SW-004 SOTA (2021)

Summits on the Air Activation Report

Activation Date: Saturday 24th April, 2021.
Activator(s): Richard M1HAX.
Summit: Waun Rydd, South Wales, Wales.
Summit ID: SOTA reference GW/SW-004 (6 points).
Summit Height: 769m elevation, 170m prominence.
Summit Location: Lat./Long. 51.87647, -3.36383. Maidenhead Grid IO81hv.
Also Activated: GW/SW-001, GW/SW-005.
Distance: 28.8km travelled with 1610m of ascent.
Difficulty: SAC Grade T2.^(?)
Elapsed Time: 9hr 45m (incl. operating and other summit(s) on the same hike).
Weather: 14°C, 29 mph ESE wind, 40% humidity.
Radio Equipment: Yaesu FTM100D, Diamond SRH771, Zippy 4200mAh 4S LiFePo4.
Callsign Used: MW1HAX/P.
Contacts: 6 (2m FM).

Trip Notes

Waun Rydd is a mountain located in the Brecon Beacons National Park in southern Powys, Wales. Standing at 769 metres (2,523 ft) above sea level with a prominence of 170 metres, it forms a large boggy plateau rising to the east of the more famous Pen y Fan. The name “Waun Rydd” translates roughly from Welsh as “free moorland.”

The mountain has a distinctive plateau form with sharp rims on several sides. The northeastern edge features Craig Pwllfa which overlooks Cwm Banw, while Craig y Fan faces east over Cwm Tarthwynni. The southern edge is known as Cwar y Gigfran, which translates to “quarry of the crow” in English. This southern rim marks the top of a significant landslip area that extends down to the Blaen y Glyn stream below.

I parked the car at the large but busy car park near Neuadd reservoir. The hike up to the summit of Waun Rydd would be the first summit on a ten-hour 29km circuit taking in Pen y Fan and Fan Fawr on a sunny April weekend.

I followed the road and then gravel track away from the car park and into the valley. Then I headed north east across pathless tussocky terrain ascending in the general vicinity of Craig Cwareli. I then picked up the footpath joining the main route from Craig y Fan Ddu towards the summit.

After passing beneath Bwlch y Ddwyallt I continued around the ridge towards the summit which is marked by a small pile of stones. The final ascent route to the top of the mountain is again pathless across grassy hillside. Thankfully the dry sunny weather made this relatively easy going.

I was a bit concerned that activating this summit at 8am on a Saturday morning would be problematic using VHF however I quite easily made the required number of contacts, speaking to some of my regular SOTA chaser stations.

I packed away the radio and prepared to make my traverse west towards the summit of Pen y Fan following the well-established footpath across Craig Cwareli and beneath Fan y Big.

Waun Rydd is a very pretty mountain which is well worth visiting. If you don’t want to complete a 29km tour of the valley then you can simply retrace your steps back down towards the reservoir and on to the car park.

If you wish to add to the 1600 metres of vertical ascent on this route then you can optionally include the summits of Fan y Big, Cribyn and Corn Du which should achieve approximately 2000 metres of ascent.

Photos

Below are some photographs taken during my activation of Waun Rydd on Saturday 24th April, 2021.

Walking Route for Waun Rydd

The interactive map below shows my GPS track taken to the SOTA activation zone for Waun Rydd. Note that this summit was activated as part of a multi-summit hike and the map below shows the full route taken on the day. The GW/SW-004 summit area is marked on the map with a blue pin icon.

You can download the route shown above as a GPX file suitable for use with most GPS devices. This file is provided for information only, to support your own walk planning and research (it may contain navigation errors, detours and/or safety hazards). The route downloads provided here are governed by the Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0 licence.

Station Log

I logged the following 6 amateur radio contacts operating as MW1HAX/P from GW/SW-004 Waun Rydd on Saturday 24th April, 2021 (all times shown are UTC):

In the notes field I will usually log the other operator’s name and the signal report they provided. In accordance with the Summits on the Air rules, I do not make a log entry where a complete exchange of callsigns and signal reports was unsuccessful.

Additional Information

The following resources may be helpful to walkers, mountaineers and SOTA activators interested in Waun Rydd:

• Sotl.as Summit Page for GW/SW-004 Waun Rydd.
• Hill Bagging UK Summit Page for Waun Rydd.
• Google Earth view of Waun Rydd.
• Wikipedia entry for Waun Rydd.
• 360° Panorama near summit of GW/SW-004 Waun Rydd.

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