All walks › Tywi Valley and Carmarthen
Tywi Valley and CarmarthenCarreg Cennen
The most dramatically sited castle in Wales, on a limestone crag three hundred feet above the river, with a passage cut into the rock leading to a cave below the walls.
- Distance
- 2.8 mi / 4.5 km
- Time
- 1 hr 40
- Ascent
- 180 m
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Shape
- Circular
Where it is
The circle shows the general area, not the exact start. Use the directions link below to get to the car park itself. Contours and paths shown are OpenTopoMap, drawn from OpenStreetMap data.
The route
A path climbs from the farm to the castle, and field paths loop below the crag and back for the view from underneath. The cave passage is inside the castle itself.
Worth knowing
- Bring a torch. The passage from the castle to the cave is long, low and completely dark.
- The view from below the crag is better than the view from the top; the loop is worth doing.
- There is an entry charge for the castle and the farm has rare breed animals.
What you’ll see
The castle on its crag, the cave passage, the Black Mountain rising to the east.
Background
The present castle is late thirteenth century, built over an earlier Welsh stronghold. It was slighted in 1462 to stop it being used by bandits.