north or south wales trail centres?

fitch28

hi all,

planning on heading to wales for our anniversary next year to get some child free riding in. just wondering where you all think would be better to head for, north or south? bear in mind we are coming from scotland so are wondering if south would be worth the extra distance or whether its better to stick with the north end e.g coed y brenin and llandegla? probably making it a long weekend.

The Northern Monkey

Theres loooaads in Wales!

Although there does seem to be a bit more in north wales..

check out http://www.mbwales.com/ tis a brilliant website

canada16

I live in cardiff.

Afan

Cwmcarn

Brecon

Kilvey Hill, but have not been just been looking

And if you take the taff trail you can get some ok riding at castle coch.

Tons and Tons in the south, and not one person would snub their nose at afan or brecon.

But have not been up north yet but want to go.

mintsauce5

Hi ,
we did llandegla two weeks ago and the beast at coed y brenin today , even though i'm absolutely knackerd tonight i'd reccomend either of those two , facilities at both were great

cambo

www.mbnw.co.uk

Specific to north wales, all you need to know

P-Jay

I live in SW and we've got some amazing riding down here! But....

It's a whole bunch of extra hours for you. I've liked all the places I've been to up North Wales apart from Coed y Brenin which doesn't suit me. LLandegla and Climach X are really good.

It's easier to get around down here though. The 2 big famous ones Cwmcarn and Afan are just off the M4 and Brechafa (which is better than them) is just a bit further down the M4.

albo

I have found the North to be far Rockier, So I only go South - I have a hardtail

Splottboy

North... I moved from Essex to live/ride here!

joshtp

i live in swansea.(if anyone eer wants some guided riding around the swansea area, there is a mega nice 4 star b&b oposite my house........) south wales has awsome stuff. Afan,brechfa,brecon,cwmcarn,kilvey hill................
but the north probably has even more. All the trail centres have loads of trails, Coed y brenin alone has enough for prob a week of riding. llandegla, nant y arian, penmachno....... all these places are suposed to be amazin (im yet to get a chance to go to the other end of my small county with a bike in tow)
its your chice, but id say south (obviously )

Anonymous

I can't really say where has the best riding, as I've never actually riden in South Wales. Well, I did a very quick blast of a shortened trail once when i was working down there for a weekend, but didn't have time to do a whole loop.
North Wales is pretty technical in terms of riding. After growing up riding the trails and mountains here, I've found myself more than prepared for anywhere else I've ridden. Whether that be big alpine descents, or freeride parks. Riding up here definitely developed my handling skills.
However, proper jumps and such are pretty thin on the ground here, if that's what you're into. It's all big terrain, very rocky, very rough, but with plenty of flow once you get the hang of it. Kind of "XC with teeth" if you will. This seems to work well for all kinds of bikes as well. You can take it steady and pick your lines on a hardtail or shirt travel XC bike, or if you've got an all-mountain bike, then you can really start attacking stuff, and treat the descents like mini-DH runs.

Anyway, what I will say is that it does tend to be easier to actually GET to places down south. They have a near-sensible road system - unlike North Wales.
However, if you're doing this as a one off for your anniversary, then I'd suggest maybe use that as an excuse to come up to North wales, and get completely lost
Since it's much easier to get to anywhere in South Wales, keep it as an option for another time, when you haven;t got a big occasion as an excuse?

rhyko7

im a south wales rider-i enjoy cwmcarn, afan and brechfa-i dont think Brecon is that good

to me though the best trail centre i have ridden has to be coed y brenin

rhette

Although there are a few good routes at both north and south trail centres,nothing compares to the riding in Scotland in my opinion. So i'd save the fuel and tour the 7 stanes

fitch28

see the thing is we go to them a lot seeing as they're within driving distance for a day trip. never been to wales before so figuring it would be a nice change.

rhette

Yeah ok. As i say there are some great rides but nothing as hard as Scottish trail centre rides.I personally would choose north Wales as it is more rocky and technical. I wouldn't bother with Llandeglla though if you regularly ride the stanes, you'd probably doze off on your way round (sparks contoversy)!!!!

Anonymous

rhette wrote:

Yeah ok. As i say there are some great rides but nothing as hard as Scottish trail centre rides.I personally would choose north Wales as it is more rocky and technical. I wouldn't bother with Llandeglla though if you regularly ride the stanes, you'd probably doze off on your way round (sparks contoversy)!!!!

I've ridden Glentress and Innerleithen, and thoroughly enjoyed both of them. I wouldn't say there's anything more technical than North Wales' riding spots, but Innerleithen definitely had more "unavoidable" trail features, like moderately large drops and so on.

North Wales tends to have features than can be safely rolled, for the most part, but if you ride flat out, then the technical level is similar, in my opinion, to Glentress / Inners.

Chinley Churner

Got to be Coed-Y-Brenin... worth it for Pink Heifer alone. Went for a long weekend of single-speed mayhem in March and had a blast. Ignore all of the bull about needing full-sus there. Some bits of the Red Bull Trail are feeling a bit dated but still good fun. You could even have a days warm-up over at Betsy on the Marin Trail.

Anonymous

for your god's sake don't call it Betsy though, or you might get punched in the face.
It's called Betws Y Coed.

Chinley Churner

yeehaamcgee wrote:

for your god's sake don't call it Betsy though, or you might get punched in the face.
It's called Betws Y Coed.

Hee, Hee! Always gets a rise from someone

fitch28

lol, i'll be avoiding calling any of them anything seeing as i have no idea how to pronounce the names of any of these places! :oops:

Anonymous

Chinley Churner wrote:

yeehaamcgee wrote:

for your god's sake don't call it Betsy though, or you might get punched in the face.
It's called Betws Y Coed.

Hee, Hee! Always gets a rise from someone

You'd get a pretty cold response from anyone local if you were calling it that to get a rize. :roll:

stunnertier1

im making my debut at Afan next week, so ill let you know, im there from monday until friday do should be doing every trail it has to offer ! cant wait !

rhette

You'd get a pretty cold response from anyone local


Isn't that what the people from north Wales are famous for!!!
Joking apart whenever I've been recently the locals are very friendly and helpful