I have used the bridge across the mouth of the Afon Mawddach many times, but probably haven’t given it the attention it deserves. Usually, arriving here marks the end of the long walk down the estuary from Dolgellau and I have been pushing for a feast of vinegar-soaked chips while waiting for my train home, or to seek a pint and a warm fire, depending on the weather. This time, I made the bridge itself my destination.
This venerable structure was built mostly from heavy baulks of timber, but has an arched iron span at the northern end, which once swung open to allow the passage of shipping. It carries both the single track of the Cambrian Coast railway line and a wooden deck that provides a short cut for walkers or cyclists who wish to avoid the much longer journey via Penmaenpool.
This is a route that should be celebrated, as it forms an important link in the Wales Coast Path , but pedestrian access is reportedly at risk from suggested budget cuts.
In the middle of the almost kilometre-long bridge I stopped and examined the view eastward, while the welcome if unexpected sunshine warmed my back. Close at hand, the mixed woodland on the whale-back mound of Fegla Fawr was showing just the first tinges of autumn colour.
Above the woods of Arthog, the fading heather flowers and bracken fronds on the hillside had started to merge towards a common light russet – cut through with grey outcrops and the occasional bright green patch of improved grassland, divided by pale dry-stone walls. Higher still, the scree slopes and the dramatic buttressed ridge that runs towards Cadair Idris loomed into the base of the cloud.
As I turned north again, I looked over the parapet into the blue, opalescent water that the ebb tide was swirling seawards. In the pale, shallower water beside the beds of seaweed, in the shadow of the bridge, a large jellyfish pulsed languidly in the fast-moving flow – just about able to control its orientation, if not its ultimate destination. I know how it felt.
