Trallong

The inscribed stone and valley terrace

Inside the Church of St David stands a stone pillar that once served as a window jamb. When C. E. Buckeridge rebuilt the derelict church in 1861 — at the instigation of the Revd Gilbert Harries, who had argued against demolition — someone recognised the marks cut into it. They are Ogam strokes and Latin letters, made around AD 500, and they commemorate Cunocennius, son of Cunogenus. A ring cross was added later, some time between the seventh and ninth centuries. Around the stone the church keeps a circular medieval font, a few surviving Perpendicular windows and a priest's door.

The church and the houses near it sit on the lip of a river terrace on the north side of the Usk valley, where the ground drops steeply towards the water. From the churchyard you look across the river to the Brecon Beacons. Brecon itself is about eight kilometres east.

Penpont produce and estate stays

For provisions, the estate farm shop at Penpont, south of the village beside the A40, grows organic fruit, vegetables and herbs in a historic walled garden. It sells estate apple juice, meat from Cwmsefin Farm, eggs, Penpont honey, jams and chutneys, and in summer bunches of flowers cut from the garden. There is a weekly veg-box collection.

Penpont House has belonged to the same family since 1665. Gavin and Vina Hogg arrived in 1992 with their sons Forrest and Joshua and began a long restoration of a house that had barely changed in a century; more than four hundred varieties of native and ornamental trees have gone into the ground since. Penpont now offers riverside camping, a wood-fired sauna, and fly-only catch-and-release fishing along about a mile of both banks of the Usk. Some of this is reserved for paying guests or by booking.

Bridge, riverside path and Sennybridge inn

Below the house, Penpont Bridge carries a minor road over the Usk in four stone arches. It is thought to date from about 1666, and was later widened on its upstream side. A path is recorded running along the river from the road down to Abersefin Farm near the bridge; it's worth checking local access before setting out.

A nearby option is the Usk & Railway Inn at Sennybridge, west along the valley; the T6 Brecon–Swansea bus serves Sennybridge, and the same bus stops in Trallong at Abercamlais Lodge and Nant-y-gwreiddyn. The inn's kitchen runs to chargrilled steaks, fish and chips, a homemade curry of the day, and Gower Gold beer-battered cod, with meat from the Brecon butcher Paddy Sweeney. Cask ales are on, alongside Brecon and Aber Falls gins.

Cycling country and Trallong's name

Cyclists have the Aberbran circuit, a nine-and-a-half-mile asphalt loop through wooded valleys and hill farms that passes the Trallong turn. It is graded for the fitter rider and carries no refreshments along the way. The outdoor writer Jonathan Manning called the country it crosses "a taste of a wild, remote part of the country."

The name Trallong has been read as meaning a very muddy place, probably for a crossing of the Nant Sefin. It was once a manor of the Bishop of St David's, a collection point for produce from the episcopal lands, and Edward I granted the bishop a weekly market and yearly fair here in 1290/91.

The private railway halts

Both of the big houses had their own railway halts, sixty-foot platforms serving Abercamlais and Penpont from 1867 until 1962. In 1900 the Revd Garmons Williams asked the railway to throw his parcels of newspapers from passing trains, and offered to cover any damage. The railway said no.