Driving across Wales during Storm Arwen to ogle some water turbines, I got diverted through Llangynog by a fallen tree and saw this:
Obviously a sizeable slate mine, although I couldn’t find out anything about it at the time as there was zero phone signal.
Nevertheless the sun had just come out, so I pulled over and went for a look.
Pictures are a mixture of phone and camera.
The obvious holes, visible from the valley floor, turned out to be walled up at the back.
Around the corner were the remains of some buildings and a winder for the first incline.
Nearby a promising sign…
…this is more like it.
There were a couple of manual winches inside near the entrance, but that was it for old machinery - the rest was a few tunnels and medium-sized, irregular caverns.
Local wildlife.
Back outside I headed up higher to look for more holes - all that waste must have come from somewhere.
More old structures at the top of the next incline and the remains of another winder.
But I didn’t find any more entrances, despite looking further on at the next incline.
I eventually gave up since the light was going and the weather was closing in again and walked back down.
Some after-the-event background.
Llangynog turns out to be a reasonably well-know area for slate and lead mines, with plenty of information online.
The remains of the largest lead mine are visible in the last photo above on the opposite side of the valley.
The largest slate mine, Craig Rhiwarth, is pictured in this post.
It was worked mainly at the beginning of the 1800s with eventual closure around WW2 when most of the equipment was scrapped.
Here’s a map, reproduced without permission from a 1968 book on the Tanat valley.
Most of the features shown still seem to be there.
The only photos I’ve found of this mine are from 2010 on AditNow.
Some of these clearly show that one of the upper levels was accessible, so anyone visiting might want to have another look for that adit.
Obviously a sizeable slate mine, although I couldn’t find out anything about it at the time as there was zero phone signal.
Nevertheless the sun had just come out, so I pulled over and went for a look.
Pictures are a mixture of phone and camera.
The obvious holes, visible from the valley floor, turned out to be walled up at the back.
Around the corner were the remains of some buildings and a winder for the first incline.
Nearby a promising sign…
…this is more like it.
There were a couple of manual winches inside near the entrance, but that was it for old machinery - the rest was a few tunnels and medium-sized, irregular caverns.
Local wildlife.
Back outside I headed up higher to look for more holes - all that waste must have come from somewhere.
More old structures at the top of the next incline and the remains of another winder.
But I didn’t find any more entrances, despite looking further on at the next incline.
I eventually gave up since the light was going and the weather was closing in again and walked back down.
Some after-the-event background.
Llangynog turns out to be a reasonably well-know area for slate and lead mines, with plenty of information online.
The remains of the largest lead mine are visible in the last photo above on the opposite side of the valley.
The largest slate mine, Craig Rhiwarth, is pictured in this post.
It was worked mainly at the beginning of the 1800s with eventual closure around WW2 when most of the equipment was scrapped.
Here’s a map, reproduced without permission from a 1968 book on the Tanat valley.
Most of the features shown still seem to be there.
The only photos I’ve found of this mine are from 2010 on AditNow.
Some of these clearly show that one of the upper levels was accessible, so anyone visiting might want to have another look for that adit.
