Today we followed a tip off from a friend who had told us that a coffee roaster had opened a little coffee bar where they roasted their coffee. It’s a driveable distance for us, but in a valley that we don’t often frequent, so rather than drive over, we decided that it would make a good objective for a gentle cycle tour.

We could have set off from the banks of the Menai Straits, but given the state of our lungs, we went for the shorter option by starting at Bontnewydd. It was only six degrees but the sun was just about taking the edge off the wind chill as we followed the railway cyclepath towards the mountains.

At Penygroes, we turned east and into the Nantlle Valley, stopping first for a drink and some left over pizza while overlooking some of the old quarry workings.

The views were superb and for a while we had a clear view down the valley to the snow covered summit of Snowdon. We took a rough track through the quarries, past several deep lakes. While stopping to peer off the edge of a cliff, we came across another couple – one of whom was one of my University Lecturers, from my undergraduate degree in Outdoor and Environmental Education! We had a good natter and swapped a few stories, before parting our ways and continuing on to the old slate courtyard that held the coffee roasters kitchen.

The little courtyard smelt splendidly of roasting coffee beans, so we knew we were in the right place. A friendly face appeared from inside and true enough, there was a little coffee bar next to the gleaming silver coffee roaster and piles of hessian sacks, bursting with green beans. We declined the offer of a couple of stools at the bar, opting for the sheltered suntrap outside.

We stayed basking in the sun and chatting together for over an hour, when the clouds began to steal the heat from the sun. It was time to move on. The return ride out of the valley was done on the ‘main’ road (not a busy one!). The views as we rode away were bathed in sunlight and felt like the colour had been ‘turned up’.

We’d both begun to chill down and soon stopped to put on bigger gloves as we rode into the headwind.

At times, the view couldn’t have been more stereotypically Welsh!

It was exactly 27km van to van and we were both suitably exhausted by the time we got home. We managed to get the fire lit and a cup of tea brewed before collapsing down on the sofa to warm up. A university mug seemed appropriate after the earlier chats! Brilliant.