Out of the woods and into the forest

1. From the Visitor Centre, follow the signs for the vehicle exit, which leaves from the far side of the car park, and follow this well-surfaced forest track for 300m to a sharp bend, and go around the barrier to keep straight ahead. Follow this track easily through the forest, past the derelict buildings of Wern Farm, where the track narrows. Continue over a brook to a crossroads, where the Taff Trail drops to the right. Keep straight ahead and you’ll soon come to some more tumbledown buildings on your right. Bear around to the left here and climb easily, with a stream gulley and clearing to your right, to a junction with another well-surfaced forest trail.
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From Fan Fawr, continue onto Craig Cerrig-gleisiad, where you can follow Walk 2 on to the National Park Visitor Centre. To descend Fan Fawr, follow the main path until it’s possible to bear left onto open moorland that leads across to Fan Frynych.
2. Turn right onto this and follow it easily along for over 2.5km to a stile that leads out onto open hillside. Keep ahead, now on a boggy path, and you’ll soon reach another stile, where you tuck back into forestry again. Keep ahead, following Taff Trail signs, until you reach another stile and the A4059.
3. Turn left onto this and walk uphill for 50m, crossing a cattle grid. At the end of the woodland on your right, turn right onto open ground. Now follow the edge of the wood up for 100m to a stile. Go over this and follow a faint path, which improves as it goes, all the way up onto the south-east ridge of Fan Fawr. Continue around the top of the escarpment to the very top, which is marked with a diminutive cairn.
4. Continue around the escarpment and stay with the path as it drops steeply down the eastern flanks of the mountain. It then levels near the top of Bryn Du, before dropping steeply again down to the A470 by the Storey Arms. From here catch the Roundabout Bus back to Garwnant, the Geopark Circular to Brecon or the bus back to Cardiff or Porthcawl.