The Georgian Kitchen Garden Traditional Cache
The Georgian Kitchen Garden
-
Difficulty:
-
-
Terrain:
-
Size: 
(regular)
Please note Use of geocaching.com services is subject to the terms and conditions
in our disclaimer.
Llanharan House - The seat of Llanharan's squires since the 1750.
A squire has resided in Llanharan since at least 1652 although there is no indication of a 'Big House' in the village before 1670.
The mansion now known as Llanharan House was built c1750 by the Powell family who by now had ownership of the entire parish at this point.
The estate was sold to Richard Hoare Jenkins in 1806 for £11,000 and it was during the occupation of this squire that Llanharan became the centre of attraction in Glamorgan, maybe even all of Wales, for the hunting fraternity. His large family tomb (he died in 1856) sits just to the right of the entrance to St.Julius & Aaron's churchyard in Llanharan (see GC2NRJQ - Church Micro).
His claim to posterity was that he was High Sheriff of Glamorgan at the time of the Merthyr riots and took an active part in helping to repress them.
Llanharan House then passed to the Blandy-Jenkins family (originally from Kingston Bagpuize, Berkshire) until it was sold again in 1954 to the Williams family of Aberpergwm who still own the house today. Both George Williams and his son Owain have been High Sherrif of Glamorgan.
Famous visitors to Llanharan House include King George II of Greece who visited in 1923 and the then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher who was there in 1989. The House has been used many times in recent years for film and television, most recently part of the interior was seen in the remake of 'Upstairs Downstairs' on the BBC.
The house was open briefly to the public in the 1980s but is now exclusively private, with no admittance to visitors. Many of the outbuildings were (sympathetically) converted into separate dwellings in the early 1990s under directions from CADW. The Parish of Llanharan & Brynna previously held church fetes in the grounds as recently as the 1990s although this tradition has now ceased.
On a personal note... Mr.Rollwrong's father worked as forester and groundsman at Llanharan House for 30 years and his grandfather also worked tending the kitchen gardens for a number of years. Mr.Rollwrong even had his first job here as a boy, painting the half mile long railings that follow the drive up to the manor. Due to his service with Mr.Rollwrong senior, 'Tramp', our Jack Russell, is buried in the pet cemetary hidden in the grounds (and has his own headstone).
So, onto the cache itself...
As can be guessed from the title, the kitchen garden is the location for the cache and luckily, the back wall of this hortus conclusus is on a public footpath.
From Llanharan Square, if you walk up the lane to the church there is a small row of terraced houses opposite. This is Church Terrace - houses originally built for the estate workers for Llanharan House.
At the top of Church Terrace is the beginning of two footpaths. You may well have noticed to rather large walls either side of this area - look more closely and you may see the remains of girders. This is the remains of a railway that brought coal down from the Meiros Colliery high on the mountainside.
Take the right hand path and you will be on your way to GZ. Keep to the field boundary on your left and you will soon spot the next stile. Contractors are currently removing timber from the woods behind Llanharan House and it can get a little muddy under foot. We'd recommend boots unless it has been particulary dry weather.
You are looking for a good sized klick-lock box hidden just to the left of the footpath itself. By following the footpath past GZ, you will emerge onto a gravel track (the Coedcae Road) with views of the rear of the house and the parklands. This again is a public right of way and continues upwards into the Garth Maelwg Forestry (eventually).
There is public parking available outside the public house on Llanharan Square (actually land given to the village by the Squire) or in the public car park at the Railway Station (see GC2YR8M -SideTracked). Please avoid parking at the Church or in Church Terrace.
Due to tree cover, the GPS signal was poor here so a spoiler picture is included. We're sure you won't need it though! :-)
Congratulations to STEVIEW100 for being FTF!!!
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Ng gur tneqra qbbe, tb yrsg hc gur fgrrc onax - ynetr ebggra ybt ba lbhe yrsg.