The second in a series of posts detailing a trip to mid-Wales in August/September 2020.

The story so far

We've visited two excellent Oak woodland reserves near Llandovery. The birding's not been bad, but it's been overshadowed by the views. Our hopes of picking up the area's specialities haven't quite been met, but there's still time. Will our luck improve? We doubt it.

For the second part of the trip, we've got a short stay in Celyn Farm B&B, which is roughly where "Forest Coal Pit" is on the map.

To Celyn Farm

We spend most of September 1st traversing from Llandovery to the farm, with a few stops along the way.

First, we head up to take a look at Llyn Brianne proper. It meets our expectations - reservoirs always seem to be completely dead, and this one is no different. It does manage some good hirundines on some of the dam building, though.

Secondly, we visit Llangorse Lake. The cafe does an excellent Fish Finger sandwich, albeit with occasional wasp interruption. AB1 does a fine job of choosing the wrong shoes, and getting cross about the fact that his leg hurts. Before the walk around the lake is curtailed (too wet) we do pick up a Yellow Wagtail messing around in the fields near the carpark. Jolly.

We make one final stop in Crickhowell to take in the town, and finally pick up a Dipper for AB2. A pair, we think - probably with a nest up a little trickle that heads off somewhere near the South side of the bridge across the Usk.

From here it's a short but fraught journey along some of the tiniest roads we've ever seen to Celyn Farm. We're extremely relieved to arrive alive and with car intact. We're even happier when we find Swallows nesting right next to the front door, and we're cheered yet further when we are shown our living quarters. Our room has excellent views over towards Sugarloaf to the South, and fields heading up the hill to the North.

The field to the North is full of Buzzards - we count 13 when we arrive, hopping about in search of a beetle snack, we guess. In addition, there are loads of Pied Wagtails, with an occasional Grey visitor. The gronk of Raven is never far away, and now and again a Red Kite tries to join in with the beetle party.

This is already much better than the Castle hotel! Our room and the offered breakfast (delicious bacon and avocado sandwiches) are also superior.

Coed y Cerrig

We originally planned to head up Pen-y-Fan today, we'll postpone that until we have four working knees between us. Instead, a gentler day, pootling around in the car. Our first stop is the tiny but beautiful Coed y Cerrig nature reserve.

The reserve has two walks; one on each side of the road. Opposite the car park, a boardwalk weaves around a very wet bit of forest (I think this is Alder carr). From the car park, an alternative short but very steep walk explores the hillier (but still forested) side of the reserve.

We focus on the boardwalk side; we can hear a lot of bird chat coming from over there. Indeed, there's a lot happening - lots of roaming flocks of the usual suspects - we quickly pick up all the usual woodland species. There's definitely a hint of something a bit different though - an occasional flit that looks...just a bit different? Instinctively I'd say flycatcher, but we really struggle for more than a glimpse; never seeing the bird sit down and stay still.

We finally get a grip on what this only after doing a complete circuit of the boardwalk. Now the mystery flitter comes to a stop on a branch we can see , and yes, it is a flycatcher; probably of the spotted variety. This view lasts for a couple of seconds before it shoots off into the distance , followed shortly afterwards by two or three other specimens - we guess a pair and their offspring? That was seriously cryptic for flycatchers; jeez.

We return to the car, and a Great-spotted Woodpecker tempts us into a quick exploration of the steeper side - that's about the only thing we see there though.

We spend the middle of the day on a mostly bird free walk from Llanvihangel (nice lunch at the Skirrid Mountain Inn, though), a rain soaked trip to Llanthony Priory (good Dipper spot (with bonus Guineafowl) on the river there though), and another set of terrifying roads to visit Ian Hislop's favourite chapel. Which is shut, because COVID.

Mynydd Du

The last action of the day could be a bit more interesting. We're going to head up into Mynydd Du forest to see if we can catch up with the Nightjars that we've read might be findable there.

We're there and parked up for half past six. This is perhaps a little early. Sunset is around 8pm, and we wouldn't expect to hear churring much before then. We have a look at a nearby map panel - it looks like there's a recently cleared area we can walk to by retracing the path of the road, and then turning off on a track to the right.

As we return to the road we spot a Dipper on the river. After much sneaking , we have an excellent view, and the Dipper, mysteriously, has not immediately drilled off; they're usually quite easily scared. We spend a while trying to photograph it. We don't do a very good job.

We eventually leave the Dipper alone (it gets collected by a friend who it disappears off down river with) and head up into the forest. We eventually climb up enough that we have an excellent view over the road, a bit of forest below us, and a decent view across a recently cleared area of forest. Nightjars apparently like a clearing, so we'll give this place a go.

The wait for sunset isn't an impatient one - the scenery is excellent and we are completely alone, except for a small cloud of Sand Martins scouring the forest edge of insectile food. As the light fails, they're slowing replaced by bats. We give the Nightjars a solid opportunity to turn up and chur for us , but with nothing doing by half past eight, we need to get back to the car before it's pitch black. The journey back to Celyn Farm is thankfully uneventful - the only living thing we encounter is a frog crossing the road.

Craig-y-Cilau: The Secret Valley

A colleague from work grew up in Crickhowell, and recommends we try a walk up near the Llangattock escarpment that is often known as the secret valley.

We ditch the car in a handy spot just beyond a cattle grid on the road up the hill out of Llangattock and we're immediately on the path. Unfortunately, we immediately lose it, distracted by a "this is not a bridleway sign" that we interpret as a "but it is the footpath". A Peregrine Falcon barrels down the hillside while we work out our error though, so all is not lost.

We do eventually find the path, and we can see where the name comes from ; before we know it, we're in the secret valley, hemmed in on one side by the escarpment to the South, and by another unnamed ridge to the North. Cool! The landscape's pretty exciting too - we go through some small fields bordered with scrubby plants, and then circuit a wet meadow at the bottom - it bizarrely has one Redpoll messing about in it. I nearly come a cropper on some wet rocks for added entertainment.

After some seriously muddy wooded areas, the path heads up the side of the escarpment to meet up with an old tramway, and the views are spectacular . Once again the birds are a bit limited - we had a good mixed flock of the usual suspects in the muddy woodland, but up here we're back to a diet of distant Raven. We stop on a handy stone to have lunch before beginning the route back.

After another close call route mistake, we decide to download the OS maps app ; it immediately stops one further route error, which is great given continuing complaints from the knee area. The path back falls steeply back down the side of the valley into the aforementioned muddy (but charming ) woodland. We're feeling mildly unlucky to have not come across any further flocks as our path slowly leaves the woods, dropping us in a field adjacent to the wet meadow from earlier (circular walks are the best).

Now, this field is half grass, and half bracken. The field border is fenced , with numerous trees, bushes etc. along the fenceline. There's a tiny shape perched on the bracken perhaps half way in. It's a Whinchat. As ever , being a Whinchat, its comfortable-human-distance is roughly twice its reasonably-photographable distance. Despite our attempts to stay low, and hew close to the wall on the field's other side, it flits back away from us repeatedly. This draws our attention to the trees that make up the field's far border, and the second Whinchat perching in there.

We spend a lot of time not moving in the hope that the birds will get used to us and go about their business, but it...totally doesn't work. Following the path over the stile into the field where they have fled sends them into deeper cover; the occasional trees on the previous fields fence line are now a contiguous mini-wood of darkness. The movement of the Whinchats does lead us to a Redstart hopping about just behind that fence, though, and a Greater-spotted Woodpecker poking about at a long dead trunk even further into the murk. The views are fleeting, but still - not a bad haul from one tiny bit of habitat.

A quick five minutes further and we're back in the car; two further stops (for cake in Crickhowell and a beer next to the canal in Gilwern) we rock up for a quick evening visit to Coed y Cerig, and then it's back to Celyn Farm for a well-earned sleep.