The route heads gently down, up, and then down again between hedgerows that yield an abundant harvest of blackberries, rose hips, and elderberries, sometimes meeting overhead to create a green corridor.
Lanes from Old Radnor, via the tiny settlement of Yardro, lead you to New Radnor and one of the finest examples of a Victorian memorial in the country. Towering nearly 80 feet (24 metres) high, it commemorates the politician Sir George Cornewall Lewis, a prolific British politician of the Liberal Party who, had he lived longer, was thought likely to have led the party into reform rather than William Gladstone.
Above the shaded graveyard of Victorian St Mary's Church are the grassy mounds of New Radnor Castle, overlooking what was a main route into central Wales. Harold, the last Saxon king of England, is credited with building the once-sizeable castle as an outpost against the understandably hostile Welsh. In 1401 Owain Glyndŵr, the self-proclaimed Prince of Wales who led the last major rebellion against the English, ransacked the town; the castle's 600-strong garrison was killed, and the castle ceased to be effective.
From New Radnor the route continues on the side of the quiet country road leading to the village of Kinnerton, which first appears in records as Kynardton in 1304, meaning "Cyneheard's farm or settlement". As with New Radnor, there was once a castle here, and all that remains are the raised earthworks of the motte and ditch dating to the medieval period.
From Kinnerton, narrow twisting lanes lead back to Old Radnor. In a field by the roadside, four massive standing stones supposedly mark the burial site of four warrior kings. Legend has it that they wait for the peal of St Stephen's bell — the signal for them to lumber down to nearby Lake Hindwell for a cooling drink.
Back in Old Radnor you can visit yet another site of a long-gone castle (it seems every settlement around the old county had one!). In the case of Old Radnor Castle, historians have long argued as to its original date, with the encircling ditch remaining the most impressive of the remains.
Acknowledgment: Text derived from the Out and Out Series; Discovering the Countryside on Foot. Pictures courtesy of Wikipedia.
