Book it and they will come...

A weekend away mountain biking is often easier said than done when it comes to getting a big group of people together. Best thing is to just pick a weekend, book the accomodation and then invite all and sundry along. And so it was for the Coed y Brenin mountain biking trip this weekend.

Coed y Brenin is near Dolgellau which is south North Wales or north Mid Wales. One of the two. Probably both. North Wales we all know about with Snowdonia and all that but I personally think that the Mid Wales area is criminally overlooked as a tourist area in Britain given that it is uniformly stunning. A couple of years ago I did a work thing at Aberystwyth which is two towns further on down into Wales and the drive was just amazing. Mountain bikers tend to know the secrets of Mid Wales as Rhayader for instance is a well trodden biking area with it’s proximity to the wonderful Elan Valley. Follow the A470: just down from Dolgellau there’s Machynlleth, sat in a quite beautiful valley and its Dyfi Forest is full of mountain biking. Onto lovely Llanidloes,(or nip over the top between these two via Staylittle and the inmpressive Clwedog reservoir); through Rhayader to Builth Wells and head down to Brecon and it’s mighty Beacons. Absolutely glorious, the lot of it. Oh, and then there’s the coastline of Cardigan Bay: Barmouth, Aberystwyth etc and points in between. Take a walk to the top of Cader Idris and you can see most of it. Actually – on second thoughts don’t go: stay away and leave the place to us mountain bikers and climbers.

I digress, back to Coed y Brenin. This place was the first ‘made’ mountain bike venue I think in the UK and I’ve visited it maybe 5 or 6 times now over the last 10 years. The absolute joy/madness of it’s flagship short and sweet “Red Bull” trail has never failed to reduce me to an endorphin fuelled, giggling wreck by the time I was racing round it’s bermed conclusion. Then there’s an afternoon out on the sprawling Karrimor trail round 40k of scenic, single tracked or fire roaded forestry, plus the more recent, more technical MBR route. A weekend at CyB involved doing all of them with the Red Bull at least twice.

The visitor centre/café was also top drawer with Sian (ex Wales champion MTB girlie) and her partner Dafydd serving up wondrous big snacks such as cheese or beans on toast (or indeed both), accompanied by huge mugs of tea. Exactly the thing hungry mountain bikers crave. There was also an excellent bike shop at the site. So, when news filtered through early this year that Sian and Dafydd had given up the center and that the place was undergoing a serious make over with new trails and shifting the visitor centre to the other side of the A470, it was difficult to know whether to be pleased or worried. Best thing really was to go a try the place out again, so that’s what we did last weekend.

Our booked accomodation was an excellent 10 berth bungalow at Ferndale (www.coedybrenin.com) within the forest iteslf, which meant we could ride from the house straight onto the trails (the visitor centre was about 10 minutes away round the easy ‘blue’ route). The house had tons of room, an Aga in the kitchen, wood burning stove in the lounge, "pet" mice on the loose, kayaking quailty river flowing next to it – all very ‘countryside’. Everyone turned up late Friday evening after their long drives – the others were the Reading bike crew, most of whom I’d met before. Rich had bought about 4 tons of food so we would certainly not go hungry and Saturday morning we tucked into eggs, bacon and beans done on the Aga. I think we were out by half 10 which is not bad considering there was 9 bikes worth of faffing to be done. Two inexperienced girls in the group sensibly opted for the easy routes so there were seven of us out on the serious trails for the day. We launched into “The Beast” and the old Red Bull now renamed “Tarw” (which is ’Bull’ in Welsh – see what they did there?). About 50k of great riding, and more for some (Rich C, Dean and Annie) as they finished off The Beast – in the dark at about 7pm.

The new and improved visitors' centre …Well, even though it's a lovely wood building and LOOKS great the old one was so good at catering for us cyclists with basic, big food that this one has a lot to live up to. They now seem to be catering for everyone (walkers and families on days out included – ciabatas anyone?) with waitress service. We ordered and then waitied nearly an hour for our food early afternoon, and they messed up the order when we did get it. Rather than complain we (well, Annie) offered some constructive criticism to the owner who was good about it actually. They were just mobbed - busier than August Bank Holiday apparently. 8 weeks it's been open and they are still struggling. But, they are going to have a re-think over the winter and hopefully get it right for next year. Fair enough. They'll get a lot of bad bress in the biking magazines and web sites for sure which is a pity. The bike shop there is actually smaller than the old one which is madness.

My fears about the trail improvments however proved to be unfounded as the new and improved routes really are amazing. Lots of technicalities though and a place only for the experienced. I think everyone came off over the bars on Saturday with some fairing better than others. Rich E (knee/ankle) and Paul (seriously onto his head and knee) were the worst injured with Warwick also putting a good effort in resulting in a neat hole in his elbow.

Saturday night after a marvellous pasta bolognaise cooked by Sue and Sylivia there was much wine and beer drunk in front of the cozy fire in the lounge. Party games materialised, such as the wicked card game “spoons” and the now legendary “team butts”, which was eventually ‘won’ by team jaundice. I think.

Sunday those intrepid souls who could still ride (Rich E and Paul retired due to their injuries) did the MBR route which for me was the best one as it was just pretty much continuous technicalities. We finished off with a flourish round the bits we’d missed out and the finale was part of the ‘blue’ route back down to our house which was an amazing rollercoaster downhill of a singletrack, blasting through the forest at stupid speeds: possibly the best bit of the whole two days. The weather by the way was excellent. One shower Sarturday and other than that lovely with little of the forecast winds in evidence. Sunday was especially good.

Then it was bikes washed; showers; the remains of the bolognaise to finish off; a quick tidy up; pack the cars; scavenge the left over food and then, sadly, it was time to break up the group and go home.

One of those perfect weekends really and hopefully we’ll do it again sometime. Ah, the joy of mountain biking: book somewhere to stay, all turn up and just get out there and ride.