The Location
St. Anne's church, Talygarn, was erected by George Thomas Clark of Talygarn House as a perpetual curacy, held first by the headmaster of Cowbridge Grammar school, later by the vicar of Llantrisant, and from 1923 by the curate-in-charge of St. Paul's. In 1924, the new parish of Pontyclun and Talygarn was constituted from the parish of Llantrisant.
Clarke achieved fame as an antiquarian and was an authority on Glamorgan Mediaeval History. He was an engineer by profession and worked alongside Brunel in the construction of the Great Western Railway. In 1850 he returned from India and married Anne, the daughter of Henry Lewis whose family were involved in establishing the Dowlais Ironworks for the Guest Family. After her death, Clark refurbished the church in memory of his wife.
In 1987, Rev. Martin Reynolds, the vicar of the parish at the time, recognised that a mosaic in the church vestry, depicting the head of an apostle, looked familiar. During his researches he found that this fragment of Byzantine artwork circa 1070, came originally from the West wall of the Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta on the island of Torcello near Venice. The mosaic was auctioned at Sotheby’s in London and reached a selling price of over £240,000. Today a replica is situated on the North wall inside the church.
Parking
The coordinates for parking for this cache can be found at:
N 51 30.659
W 003 24.228
The best way to access the parking is:
from Pontyclun direction - turn right straight after the national speed limit signs;
from Cowbridge direction - turn left just before the 30 mph speed limit signs.
The Cache
This cache is brought to you by kind permission of the Reverend G.P. Karamura, vicar (incumbent) of the parish of Pontyclun with Talygarn.
This is a multi-cache with the final coordinates being:
N 51 PQ.RST
W 003 UV.WXY
The clues for the coordinates:
1.) How many stones circle the manhole cover in front of the church?
A
2.) On the sign at the main driveway gates, what are the 6th and 11th numbers of the contact telephone number that has been provided for the Vicar?
BC
3.) On the way back up to the church, how many trees line both sides of the road (stop counting at the top of the rise, near an old wall)?
DE
4.) As you stop counting trees you should be near an old fence post. What date is carved into the post?
FGHI
5.) On the main door into the church there are a number of silvery metal studs. How many?
JK
6.) What was the difference in years between when the church was restored to when it was rebuilt?
LMN
PQ = (G + I) * J
RST = (100 * (K + L)) + A + F
UV = (B * G) + C
WXY = (100 * L) + (G * K)
Hope you had fun counting the trees for no reason.
If anybody would like to expand to this series please do, I would just ask that you could let Sadexploration know first so he can keep track of the Church numbers and names to avoid duplication
To view the church micro stats page, please click here
First to find
Congratulations to Team-Brain for getting FTF.