Frozen/O`r rhewgell Part 2

A BBC Wales news report from 1982, showing Wales four days after the snow storm.

Chapter 41

FROZEN PART 2

1982

So I sat there on the 550, slowly, and quietly freezing to death, staring out into the frozen landscape that lay before me.

I knew if I did not continue with my journey home immediately, I would be found frozen, sitting on the bike like an ice statue.

So I let the clutch out, and engaged the engine, and slowly made my way across the traffic lights, the lights still blinked at me with their limited choice of colour`s, first red, then red and amber, followed by green and then amber once more, repeating this routine on the four intersecting roads, bringing some colour to the snowy white world that I was moving through, it was a little like being in a disco held inside a freezer without the music.

I passed the flat in Nolton street where Wobble and Fat Mike once shared, I looked up as I passed beneath the bay window, wishing that they still lived there, Wobble, Bridgeman and Fat Mike, were all now living down by the coast in a flat in Southerndown.

Mike at the end of 1982 moved to South Africa.

( In the following years, I only seen mike twice, and that was by chance, I bumped into mike in Bridgend town, this was the late 80s, as I was crossing the road in Wyndham street, he was sitting in the driving seat of a taxi, he spotted me crossing over the road, and he called out to me as I crossed over in front of him, we had a chat for a little while, I didn’t even know he was back in country, he was working has a driver for a local taxi company, the other time I saw him was when I used a taxi coming back from a night out in Porthcawl, and he was the taxi driver, I was sitting in the back seat, I only seen the back of his head, so I did not recognize him, but he knew me immediately, I had a chat with him for the length of the journey, and that was in the mid 90s and that was the last time I saw and spoke to him, Sadly mike died in 2009, I have to say I enjoyed mikes company, he was very dry with his humor, but he always made me laugh ).

If Mike and Wobble were still living in the flat, I would have taken refuge in there, and given up my journey and spent the reminder of this winter's tale in Bridgend drinking Mike’s white Jamaican rum.

But I kept moving, passing all the snow covered shops, which were all dark and lifeless and not a soul to be seen, there was a glimmer of light inside the Old Castle pub, but I could seen no evidence of and life inside, the drifts were actually up to the first floor in some cases, the whole front of some of the shops above the display windows were completely covered by the snow drifts.

There was no direct route down this street, there were snow drifts everywhere, I had to snake my way down and negotiate each mound of snow as I came up to it, moving from one side of the street to the other, finding my way around the larger obstacles, this slowed me down big time, and it took me much longer to ride down this short street then I thought it would have taken me, it did make me think that, if this south end of Bridgend was like this, what was the rest of my journey going to be like as I slowly headed north.

I was still around ten miles from the valley, and I knew the snow would have been much worse up there.

( Photo 1 ) . Wyndham street Bridgend, the Railway pub directly in front and you and can see the edge of the Dunraven pub on the right side, this photo was taken around four or five days after the snow storm had passed, all the cars you can see had been left there from the beginning of the snow storm.

I came to the end of Nolton street, just shy of the Kings Head pub, there I could see a car trying its best to get out of a snow drift, there was a well-built man, and from the look of him he must have won a few pie eating contests in his day, he was trying to push the car, he was pushing on the rear of the car with both hands extended with his head down looking at the snow covered road, with both feet firmly en-bedded into the snow, he was putting all his weight into the effort of getting the car moving, the tires of the car just spun on the spot kicking up a spray of snow, and leaving dirty black skid marks in the once brilliant white snow.

I stopped the bike and let the bike tick over, I took my gloves off, and put one on top of the engine to defrost a little, and the other flat under the side stand, the snow on the ground was now frozen, but I did not want to take any chance of the bike falling over, once I was happy with the bike being stable with no danger of it slowly sliding into the snow, I walked over to the skidding car, I don't think I would have had the energy to lift the bike back up again, if it fell onto it's side, I then joined the big guy trying to get the car out of the drift.

The King’s Head pub was open for business, and had a bar full of people who had struggled through the snow to sink a couple of pints.

One of the customers came out of the main entrance with a lite fag in his hand, he saw the two of us trying to move the car, he put the fag in his mouth and then proceeded to help us push, we rocked the car back and forth and eventually the tires gripped, and off the car went slipping and sliding away, the driver was having trouble steering the car, but he managed to beep his horn as a thank you for the help, has he drove past Boards Garage and disappeared out of sight down the Rhiw.

The man that was first pushing the car said “ he won't get far, I did tell him, I just came up from Sunnyside, he will be stuck at the bottom of the Rhiw, Queen street and the bridge across the river are still blocked for traffic “, he took a deep breath and said “well I think I earned a pint for that, take care guys” and with those last words he disappeared into the pub kicking the snow off his shoes, as he passed through the pub door.

The other guy stretched his back, and looked up into the dark sky and took a long drag on his fag and said to me “ where are you going in this weather “.

I answered “ I’m trying to get home, up to the Garw “.

I spoke to him has I removed my glove from under the side stand and sat on the bike, I then placed the glove under the tank on top of the engine with the other glove, just to take the chill of it before I moved off.

The fag guys said “ you’d better get a move on then, and to be honest I don’t think you will make it, nothing is moving anywhere, there’s been no traffic in town for days, only fools like that guy that just drove off, all he as done is moved his car into a new snow drift”.

I said “ I have to try, I have come this far, maybe I will have to walk the last few miles, but I will get home”.

The fag guy said “ well best of luck your going to need it, I’m going back inside, its fucking freezing out here”, he took another long drag on his fag, and then flicked the stub into a snow drift where it fizzled out immediately, he then turned and went back into the pub.

I continued my journey down the remainder of Nolton street, and then stopped at the junction of Derwen road and Caroline street, I did this to warm up again, and was trying to decide which way to go.

It was completely dark now, the streetlights cast their pale yellow light over the snow.

The silence was still around me, it was very strange not to hear any sounds in Bridgend, it was always busy here, the snow had turned the town into a silent eerie ghost town.

I could just pick up some sounds in the distance, I could hear the muffled sound of others, but could not make out where anyone was.

There was no-one in sight, the streets were devoid of people.

I looked down at the ground scanning the piled up snow, I could not make out the locations of the pavements, the snow was piled up everywhere, everything was buried beneath a thick blanket of snow, the shop windows and doorways were completely covered by the snow drifts.

( Photo 2 ) . Adare street Bridgend, this photo was taken a few days after the snow fall, when people started to go to the shops for bread and milk.

I could see Derwen road was impassable, nothing had ventured down this old street, there was no way I could ride down there, there was far too much snow, it was the shortest route for me through town, because this road was blocked to me, I would now have to loop around the center and double back on myself, I could see the lights were on in the Castle pub, I was sitting outside another pub while I warmed myself up, I ignored the temptation of going inside, so I headed down the slight slope that ran down into Caroline street.

I made my way passed Barclays bank, and rode across what would have been the pavement, if I could see have seen it outside the Wyndham arms and then under the solemn gaze of the first and second world war memorial and then headed up market street.

Up ahead of me I could just make out something standing in the road, it was right smack in the middle of the road opposite the bus station café, as I moved closer to this new obstacle I could see it was a huge snowman.

There were around five young kids standing around the snowman, all around 10 or 11 years old, and they were having a snowball fight over and around the snow man.

The kids were dressed up like Eskimos, and they were loving playing in the cold and the snow, I could hear them shouting and laughing has they launched snow balls at each other, this was the muffled noises I had heard earlier when I was outside the Castle pub, they must have been freezing, but it did not seem to bother them, they were all wearing knitted woolen balaclavas with the addition of hoods over their heads, they looked more like bank robbers than kids building snowmen.

I rode slowly passed with my feet still on the ground and in first gear.

All the kids stopped their snow ball fight, and watched me as I very slowly passed their snowman, and then the little fuckers started to throw snowballs at me.

I could hear cries of “ GET HIM “ and “ HE'S IN OUR TERRITORY “, “ INVADER “ and then a flurry of snowballs started smashing against my helmet and body, a snowball disintegrated on the tank spraying frozen snow particles everywhere, and then more snowballs hit the bike and my helmet, many of the white missiles went straight passed me but enough of them connected.

I shouted at them “ fuck off, you little twats “, this response from me only increased the volley of snowballs.

I just kept going trying to make some distance from the little shits.

I was having enough trouble keeping the bike up right with the rear wheel spinning out on me in all directions, and trying to pick my way through the snow ruts without being the prime target for a totally random snowball execution.

They kept throwing until I managed to get out of their range, and then they turned on each other once again.

I passed the Cambrian Pub and then under the old black steel railway bridge and then headed up pasted the Coity Castle pub and then up Coity road out of the center of Bridgend.

( Photo 3 ) . Coity road, three days after the snow storm, this section is just up from the Coity Castle pub and the black railway bridge.

I stopped, near to the junction that leads to the entrance of the Caeffatri pub to warm myself up again, and to brush off all the snow off my jacket, and also from the rev counter and speedo clocks, which took a direct hit from the snowball ambush.

I was hoping this was a safe place to stop and not get ambushed by more snowball welding psychopathic kids dressed up as Jawa`s from the Star-wars movies.

The snowball ambush was the lest of my worries.

I could no longer feel my toes, my fingers felt like they had been dipped into an ice bucket, and the water had frozen around them, I could hardly move them, my scarf was building up with so some much ice the scarf stated to slip down from my face with the weight of the frozen snow, so there was something else I had to do when I stopped, I needed to break the ice up on the scarf with my hands, so it would flake of the scarf in small pieces.

Once I had finished with clearing all the snow of myself and the 550, I carried on once again, I rode to Litchard cross and up the hill, which I had no problem ridding up, I did not need to slow down or brake, and so I glided all the way up the hill without little effort or stopping, which I was happy about.

I passed the Red Dragon pub on the hill, I could see the lights were on and people inside.

I was tempted to stop again, but now I could see the foot hills of the valleys in the distance, I told myself that it won't be long now and I would be sitting by a warm fire drinking a hot cup of tea.

I had not seen a soul since I left Bridgend, I crossed over the motorway bridge at Sarn, there was nothing moving on the motorway, I could see some abandoned cars and lorry’s that had been left by their owners.

I passed through Brynmenyn where Brian lives, he still lived in the village, but he no longer lived in the Miners Rescue Station which his dad ran, he now lived just around the corner opposite the church and behind the Fox and Hounds pub in a small row of miners cottages called ( new houses ) which had been built many decades before 1982, they were new more than 100 years before.

I did not stop, I focused on going home, and kept heading north towards the village of llangeinor. I still rode in first gear and with my feet down, sliding over the top of the thickly packed frozen snow, I rode like this all the way to llangeinor square, stopping outside the Green Meadow pub to warm up and while I sat there, I saw the first people since leaving Bridgend.

( Photo 4 ) . The photo shows the snow falling on two pubs in Pontycymmer, the closer pub at the front of the photo is the Squirrel, and the one in the background is the Royal Hotel.

A couple of people around the late 30s were heading for the Green Meadow pub.

As I passed them, the man called out to me and said “ you won't get up the valley on that bike, nothing is moving, your better off going to the pub and stay in there “.

I stopped and said “ I’ll be fine, I’m getting the hang of this snow riding now “, in truth I really wanted to stop and give up, I was so cold, the only thing that kept me going was blind stubbornness, I was determined to finish the journey home whatever the end result was.

Llangeinor was at the base of the Graw valley, and from this point on, I would encounter a series of steep hills, tight bends and server drops of 100`s of feet if I left the road, so the easy bit of my journey was behind me.

So I pulled off once again, and rode up the first hill passed the pub with my rear wheel spinning out everywhere, I had to give the bike more power because of the steepness of the hill, and this made the whole bike unstable, I throttled off as the hill leveled off and rode passed Hot Wells, there was nothing hot about this place at the moment, I carried on following some snowy ruts on the road that were left behind by some large vehicle that had passed this way in previous days, and then I stopped at the foot of the long steep hill at Tylagwyn.

The snow was much deeper here then it was down in the vale and Bridgend.

Only a few more miles now and I’m nearly home, I was trying to convince myself that this ride was a good idea, oddly enough I was not feeling the cold so much now which was a danger sign that my core temperature was dropping.

I was feeling really tired, I was not sure if it was because of the road conditions which I had to battle through or the fact that I had been riding for hours and not getting anywhere, or it was another symptom of the server cold, I think hypothermia may have been knocking on the door.

The tires crunched as I rode along.

The road surface was covered with deep snow, because of the very low temperature the snow had turned to ice, it was far more difficult to make my way up this hill.

( Photo 5 ) . Victoria street Pontycymmer, this is the main road that runs up through the valley, this photo was taken three days after the snow storm, Carn mountain in the distance at the north end of the valley.

It was very dark now, my headlight, lite up the road in front of me, and the streetlights cast their own yellow shadows in the white gloom, and with the shadow that was created from my own headlight, it made it very difficult to judge where the best route through the snow was to take as I slowly made my way up the hill.

My back end kept slipping and sliding in all directions, every inch I traveled was hard work.

The snow furrows and ruts were very deep and narrow, not to mention the large snow drifts that blocked my way all along the length of the hill. It was necessary to cross over from one snow rut to another just to keep moving forward.

I worked my way up the Tylagwyn hill.

I had to stop and get off the bike three times and walk alongside the bike to get myself out of a tricky spot where the bike would not grip the frozen surface.

I kept the bike running and walked alongside it, with me holding the bike up while operating the clutch and throttle as I walked alongside it, the bike was sliding in all directions and so was I, it was impossible for me to get a firm footing, I was in danger of having the 550 falling on top of me all the way up the hill.

I eventually made it to the top where the road levels off, there was a short flat piece of road that ran into the village of lluest.

At the top where I had stopped, there were some rusty corrugated old type of garages on my right, and there was an abandoned car that looked like it had run off the road or had been dumped by the driver.

I could see the snow had been flattened down around the vehicle, so I did not bother to investigate this car, making the assumption that whoever left the car there had already made their own way home.

If I had stopped to take a look, I don’t think I would have got going again, I was so cold, so very cold, it is really hard to describe how I felt at the time, but I was starting to think, fuck it and just give up.

I was not tired but exhausted with the journey, the cold was biting at my bones and my mental resolve of getting home was waning.

The cold was wining.

I sat there trying to warm myself like I had done all the way from Wick, it didn’t seem to work anymore, I could not feel my feet or my hands, the engine was red-hot, the Honda had traveled all the way from wick in first gear, and really needed to cool down.

But I decided on one last push, I was only a few miles from home.

I put my gloves on with some difficulty, they were still frozen despite being put on the engine to warm up.

Frost had started to cover the petrol tank and the round glass of my clocks, the frost had started to attach itself to my leather jacket, the sleeves of my arms were white with frost, the leather was stiff and creaked when I moved my arms, I looked down at my legs and feet, they were white with ice, the snow had frozen on the lower part of my legs, I was so cold I had not noticed.

I told myself no stopping for anything this time, next time I stop the bike was when or if I get home, I was having grave doubts at this stage in the ride, if I would ever get home.

I passed the village of lluest, and not seeing a soul, it was cold and dark, normal people were sitting in their homes enjoying the warmth of their fires.

There was a long open twisty stretch of road that runs along halfway up the side of the mountain between LLuest and Pontycymmer, with a very long drop down to the river at the bottom of the valley on the left side of the road.

This part of the road took me ages to travel over, the snow drifts were everywhere and huge, I needed to go around them, the bike slipped out and laid itself down on its side around five times as I half climbed the drifts, as there was no way around them.

I worked my way through the small village of Pantygog, and then down the hill which leads into Pontycymmer, which I literally slid down just like I did outside the village of Saint Brides, and there at the bottom of the hill was the village road sign.

( PONTYCYMMER )

( Photo 6 ) . The Pontycymmer road sign, the council left one M off the village name to save money, ( that’s not a joke ), I actually phoned up the council department responsible for the roads signs, and that was the excuse they used to explain away the misspelling of the sign, I know it's not relevant to the story, but I just found it bizarre.

I had five more hills to deal with before I arrived home, and two of them were going to be very difficult, the first being ffaldau hill which was going to be a big test, if I could not get up that one I had no chance of the second one which lead up to my house.

I did not stop at the road sign, and just rode past and crawled up the slight hill that lead past Pen-clawed and into the village shopping area of Oxford street .

The snow here was the thickest I had come across so far, I was riding over drifts in the middle of the road, I rode like this all the way down Oxford street until I finally arrived at Pontycymmer square.

And there before me was ffaldau hill.

This hill was going to a big problem, the snow was thick on the ground, there was hardly any signs of traffic.

I sat still for the final time at the base of the hill, looking up and trying work out if I could get over the hill.

From the look of it no-body else had even tried to come down or climb up the hill, which didn’t really give me any confidence in the task I had in front of me.

There were a few people milling about on the square heading towards the Ffaldau pub on the square, and over to the Royal Hotel that was over the black steel railway bridge on the Garreg side of the valley, there was always one or two people willing to brave the weather for a couple of pints.

The scene on the square was very Christmassy with all the snow covering everything, and the light shining from the pub windows on the snowy landscape, the dull yellow light cast by the streetlights made it look quite picturesque.

I made a decision, I had not come all this way to give up at the last hurdle.

So off I went with the back wheel sliding and skipping out in all directions as I turned the power on, the rear wheel was refusing to grip on the frozen snow and spun in one spot, I could smell the tire burning under the effort.

( Photo 7 ) . Hot Wells looking north towards Tyla-gwyn, I was on the last leg of my journey at this point in the valley with only three miles or so before I would arrive in Pontycymmer, little did I know how hard this would be, and that it be would be the hardest part of my journey.

Riding like this I manage to get halfway up the hill.

The hill was far to steep for the bike to take, it was impossible for me to make any more progress, I had come all this way and failed at the last hurdle only half a mile from my home.

I had no option, there was no way I could get up the hill and I had no way of turning the bike around, so I let the bike roll backward only using my front brake to control my decent.

I let the brake go and I rolled back until I was alongside the junction to Waun Bant, this was the small street that my grandparents lived in.

So I rolled back a little further and half turned the bike to cross over a small drift into Waun bant.

This street had a small rise as I passed Hughes fish and chip shop which was no problem, I was an expert at riding over snow drifts at this point in the game.

I pulled up outside my Bampie`s house ( one of the Welsh names for Grand-father ) I parked up alongside the curb outside their house, and made sure the bike was secure and would not fall over.

I could see the light was on though the living room window, but I knew if I had gone in I would not want to come back out to make the remaining journey home, and I did not want all the fuss my Grandmother would have put on me, she still treated me like I was a five year old.

If I went in she would have most likely given me a hot water bottle, a mug of Coco and sent me to bed with a slap across my head for going out in the snow.

It was bitterly cold so I left my helmet on as I started walking up the last half mile of my journey.

The walk home was going to be all up hill, the exercise would soon warm me up a little.

I walked up Waun Bant, then cut up across the rough unofficial foot path between lower Adare street and Waun Bant, the snow was nearly up past my waste, if it had not been frozen so hard because of the low temperature, I would have been buried deep into it, luckily I only disappeared just over my knees.

It was a struggle, but I managed to get past the deep snow, and then walked up lower Adare past the junction of David street and then on to Upper Adare street, as I walked past the junction of David street, I could see it would have been impossible for me to have ridden up the hill, it looked like one giant snow drift all across the hillside.

There was still no-one around, just like most of the villages I had passed on my journey, the valley looked like a ghost town.

It was just too cold to be outside.

I continued walking and finally arrived outside my front door.

It was now just after 22:00 pm.

It had taken me 10 hours to get to my front door.

I approached the front door, I then proceeded to pull my gloves off with my teeth one finger at a time, and then I struggled to take my house keys out of my jacket pocket, I could not pull the zip down, my hands and fingers were too cold to work properly, they were stiff with the cold, and I had no feeling in them anymore, I had more problems putting the key in the lock, I could not hold the key steady enough to slid it into the Yale lock.

I finally opened the door and the heat from inside the house rushed past me, which was very welcoming.

I closed the door behind me, the stairs in these old mining cottages were directly behind the front door, I went straight there and sat on the third step up.

I had the keys in my mouth and put my now blue hands between my legs, I could not take my helmet off, my hands would not work to unbuckle the straps.

Life was starting to come back in my hands, and they started to hurt like hell as the blood warmed them up and brought some life back into them.

My mother heard me come in and shouted from the other room “ your in are you, I didn’t hear the bike “.

I replied “ mam, can you do me a favor and undo my buckle on my helmet “, which she did with some effort as it was frozen solid, and then she said “ you look perished, I’ll make you a cup of tea “.

And after this long cold hard journey, that cup of tea was a god send, apart from riding in the snow for 10 hours in minus -10 temperatures I had nothing to eat or drink in all that time and the cold nearly beat me.

And I have never complained about being cold ever again after this experience.

( Photo 8 ) . Oxford street Pontycymmer after the snow plough had passed though the village and opened the roads to traffic, the Squirrel pub, ffaldau colliery and Carn mountain can be seen in the background.

( Photo 9 ) . Night time view of Blaengarw Square, the village at the very end of the valley, looking south down the valley.

( Photo 10 ) . Pontycymmer, looking south down the valley, you can see the storm front moving in, the heavy fall of snow was just about to begin.

It was an experience I would never forget, and never want to repeat.