Country diary: These hills are my life, but still they chill my bones

Cwm Pennant, Gwynedd: There is something about these falcon-haunted cliffs that makes me shiverThere are places in the Welsh hills where I'm assailed with a sense of unease. Often they are hill-passes. Below Garn Prys, the descent from Bwlch Blaen y Cwm alongside the Nant Llan-gwrach - "stream of the witch's enclosure" - always brings an involuntary shiver; as does that from Bwlch y Ddwy Elor - "the pass of the two biers" - into Cwm Trwsgl, the "rough cwm", and thence into Cwm Pennant.I walked this way recently in bright wintry weather and still felt a certain dread that only faded as I emerged from the cwm and started the rattly descent over slate spoil to the old tramway that contours round the western slopes of Moel Lefn and Moel Hebog. Continue reading...