My Wales: Resolven – Mining and Musical History
I am a housewife with three young children, living in the village of Melin Court, Resolven. I was born and brought up in Cardiff, but was always a country girl at heart.
As a child, I spent a lot of time visiting relatives on a farm, in a village called Tonna, in the Neath Valley. One day I decided to travel further up the valley and take a look at Resolven. The village had an appealing name, and on looking up its meaning I discovered that it was ‘a gazing place’. Little did I know then, that I would make my future home there.
As the bus left Tonna, the valley walls loomed. My first glimpse of them was in autumn, and they were decorated in a myriad of seasonal colours; russet, red and gold. Looking down into the valley, there were farm fields, some like great silver lakes, flooded by the river after heavy rain, which I now know to be a usual occurrence in this very wet valley.
The rain leaves everything looking clean and fresh, and early in the morning, spirals of mist hang everywhere, like a great white curtain suspended in the air.
At Melin Court, there is a spectacular waterfall. You can walk up Waterfall Road, past Melin Court chapel (built in 1799) to the top of the falls. Here the view is breathtaking; colourful nature in every direction. The falls cascade down to form a brook, alongside which is a path leading from the main road to the foot of the falls. You can actually climb behind the great cascade. Sitting on a rock, watching the ceaseless flow and feeling the power of the water as it crashes against the rocks, one is filled with awe.
The village of Resolven is bustling with people, most of whom have lived there all their lives and would never want to live anywhere else. Despite the closure of the local mines, around which the community grew, the heart of this village will never stop beating. Truly ‘a gazing place’, the views from the village have a natural unspoilt charm.
There are many delightful footpaths; the restored canal towpath is one such walk, past the old Ty Banc cottage, formerly a lengthsman’s cottage, now tastefully renovated as a quaint tea room by the Enfys Trust. At weekends, you can watch or take a ride on the Thomas Dadford barge, navigating the locks along the way. There are also plans to re-run old steam trains through the valley with the main depot at Resolven. All these developments are bringing much-loved history back to life.
Resolven is truly a Welsh village, full of mining and musical history, with its choirs, opera, and also a passion for the game of rugby. I am fortunate to have lived here for the past nine years.
©Lorraine Surringer for ‘My Wales’ Wales on Sunday, November 18 1990
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