International Student Trip- Valleys & Views

A place in west Wales, Aberystwyth, background with the pier

Aberystwyth Castle

Llandrindod Wells; with friends

Red Dragon, typical symbol of Wales

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Valleys & Views - taking in the majesty of the Brecon Beacons, the Victorian town of Llandrindod Wells, the feat of engineering of the Elan Valley Reservoir system, Wales's oldest University town, Aberystwyth, then Lampeter and Carmarthen.

My student union organized a day trip around Wales on Saturday morning (4oct2008)until evening on the same day. A little about the places that we went.

The Brecon Beacons range consists of the mountains to the south of Brecon. The highest of these is Pen y Fan (886 m); other notable summits include Corn Du (873 m), Cribyn (795 m), and Fan y Bîg (719 m)

Llandrindod Wells (Welsh: Llandrindod), known locally as "Llandod", is a town in Powys, Wales. It was developed as a spa town in the 19th century, with a boom in the late 20th century as a centre of local government. Before the 1860s the site of the town was common land in Cefnllys parish

The Elan Valley Reservoirs are a chain of man-made lakes and reservoirs in the Elan Valley in Powys, Mid Wales (also known as the "Welsh Lake District"), using the rivers Elan and Claerwen. The reservoirs are Claerwen, Craig Goch, Pen-y-Gareg, Careg-ddu, and Caban Coch.

The work carried carried out over a hundred years ago to build the Elan Valley dams and reservoirs was only part of the huge undertaking. Almost as impressive was the challenge of delivering the enormous quantities of water by gravity alone, across very hilly country and over many river valleys, to a new reservoir on the outskirts of Birmingham in the West Midlands of England. This involved building a 73 mile long Elan aqueduct down which the water travels at less than 2 miles per hour, taking one and a half days to get to Birmingham.

Aberystwyth (English: Mouth of the River Ystwyth, pronounced /ˌæbəˈrɪstwɪθ/ dialect: IPA: [abɛrˈəstɔʏθ]) is a historic market town, administrative centre and holiday resort within Ceredigion, Wales. It is often colloquially known as Aber, and is located at the confluence of the River Ystwyth and Rheidol.

In modern times Aberystwyth has become a major Welsh educational centre. The permanent population is around 12,000, but for nine months of the year the 7,000 resident students associated with Aberystwyth University take this total to about 19,500 people.

Aberystwyth has a pier and a fine seafront which stretches from Constitution Hill at the north end of the Promenade to the mouth of the harbour at the south, taking in two separate beach stretches divided by the castle. Today it is essentially made up of four different areas: Aberystwyth town, Llanbadarn Fawr, Waunfaur and Penparcau, with Penparcau being the most populous.

Lampeter (Welsh: Llanbedr Pont Steffan, or more informally, Llambed) is a town in Ceredigion, Mid Wales, lying at the confluence of the River Teifi and the Afon Dulas.

In 1991 the population of the town was recorded as 1,989 people, of which 1,410 were Welsh speaking. Lampeter is therefore the smallest university town in both Wales and the United Kingdom. The university, in a normal year, adds a further 1,000 people to the town's population, which gives the rural town a somewhat cosmopolitan feel.

Carmarthen (Welsh Caerfyrddin - caer fort + Myrddin Moridunum) is the county town of Carmarthenshire, Wales. It is built on the River Towy and has a population of about 13,148 [1]

Carmarthen has a number of surviving heritage attractions including the Roman amphitheatre and the castle. The Gwili Railway, a section of the former railway line to Aberystwyth, has also been re-opened as a heritage railway for tourists.

Carmarthen has a large proportion of Welsh speakers, with the county of Carmarthenshire as a whole having the largest population of such by number (the largest Welsh-speaking population by proportion is in Gwynedd). Although Carmarthen is on navigable water the harbour no longer sees commercial use, in part due to the treacherous approaches. Carmarthen is location of the headquarters of Dyfed-Powys Police, home to Trinity College Carmarthen - an associate higher education provider of the University of Wales as well as the West Wales General Hospital.