Last week on the Oakeley blog, we featured the brilliant RPSB charity for birds and wildlife. Did you know that the RSPB manage several nature reserves in Wales? And here’s a walk around one of the local ones to us here at the Oakeley Arms. Enjoy this lovely Barmouth RSPB Walk – at the Mawddach Estuary’s Arthog Bog, which is home to all sorts of weird and wonderful plants, flowers and birds.

Where:              Arthog Bog, near Fairbourne, Gwynedd.

Distance:          Approx 2 miles

Difficulty:          Easy – short walk and flat terrain

Start:                Morfa Mawddach Station Car Park (Take A493 between Dolgellau and Fairbourne, then between the villages of Arthog and Friog leave the main road at the signpost for Morfa Mawddach station and follow to station). Nearest postcode for sat nave is LL39 1BQ (approx)

Grid Ref:           SH 628 140

Maps:               OS Explorer OL23: Cadair Idris & Bala Lake

Directions: 

1: From the top end of the car park, pass the information board and follow the footpath that leads alongside the railway line. Quite soon, you’ll see a small stile in the fence on the right. Cross it and then bear straight ahead and follow the line of a rocky embankment, aiming for the left-hand side of a small wooded hill ahead. As you reach it, this leads to a grassy path around the left edge of the hill.

2: Follow the path then at terrace of houses, follow footpath sign that leads around back. At  tarmac lane turn left, then very soon turn right along a rough path.

3: Just before cattle grid at drive for Bryn Celyn, turn right and go through gate. Go immediately through another gate straight ahead (ignore the gate on left) and along the path that leads over marsh land (these fields form part of the Arthog Bog Nature Reserve).

4: Follow path and through gates to reach old railway line (the Mawddach Trail). Turn right and follow trail back to car park. The main entrance to the Nature Reserve is approx 100m on the road before car park, so if you’d like to explore further, turn left when you reach the car park and walk along the road you drove down earlier to the Nature Reserve entrance. Explore, then walk back to car park.

The nature reserve is open at all times and there are no entrance charges.

Dogs are permitted but must be controlled at all times.

For more information see www.rspb.org.uk and search for Arthog Bog.

Points of Interest

1: The terrace of houses (Mawddach Crescent) was built in the early 1900s by entrepreneur Solomon Andrews. His intention was to build a whole holiday resort here, but most of the land proved to be unusable.

2: The raised bogs of the type at Arthog Bog would at one time have covered much of the Mawddach Estuary.

**These directions are for guidance only. The Oakeley Arms can accept no responsibility for any loss, damage or injury resulting from the use of this information. The information quoted is correct at the time of writing. Always take a map with you and be prepared for the weather for turn. Do not venture out in bad weather.