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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size: 
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This is the twenty-first of a series, the "Caerphilly Collection", that will explore the whole Borough Council area. Twmbarlwm is a distinctive summit offering arguably the best views over the Bristol Channel. An Iron Age Hillfort occupied its flat top and, later, a motte was built at the eastern end. The cache is in a small plastic box. Starting from Cwmcarn or Risca, expect an overall walk of about 4 miles with 1000' of ascent, steep in parts and possibly muddy.
The Caerphilly Collection is distinguished with a unique CC number and is made up of 50 caches. The caches vary in difficulty and type and usually have other "C" word connections - castle, cheese, coal, canal, etc. There may even be Cryptic Clues for Clever Clogs! The current Caerphilly unitary authority grew out of the former Rhymney Valley and Islwyn Councils and stretches from the outskirts of Cardiff and Newport in the south to the Brecon Beacons, north of Rhymney. Despite a past dominated by coal and heavy industry, it has a diverse history and varied and dramatic scenery. We hope you will enjoy exploring it with us.
Towards the end of the Collection is CC48 The Accumulator, the location of which is given in coded form. The translation details of the code are distributed around the whole Collection, but only about a third of the caches will contain a piece of the code, which is on the back of the Log Book. To do the Accumulator, you will need to keep a note of each piece of code that you find. Unless you are very lucky, you will need to find the majority of the Collection in order to do the Accumulator. The Accumulator cache is hidden in an area of difficult terrain and demanding navigation, with a 5,4½ rating.
CC21 is near the motte which is still impressive and sufficiently large to make Twmbarlwm distinctive from miles away. Tackled within a circular walk, it would be convenient to combine this cache with CC19 on the Raven Walk subset. If you don't fancy such a strenuous walk, there are two options. From Cwmcarn, you can use the Forest Drive (for which there is a £5 (2013) charge per car), which is punctuated by viewpoints, picnic/barbecue areas and a variety of other facilities. One of the stopping points is at Pegwn-y-bwlch, marked by a life-sized statue dedicated to SARDA, the search and rescue dog association. It is still a steep climb from here to the summit, about ½ mile away and 300' higher. If you can find your way around the lanes to the south, it is also
possible to park at N 51 37.596 W 003 05.239, leaving a slightly (but not by much!) easier walk to the motte. Yes, CC stands for compulsory climbing, whichever way you tackle this cache. If you adopt one of the easier options, the terrain rating can be reduced by 1. It can get very busy on Twmbarlwm in good weather, so caution may be necessary in extracting and hiding the cache.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Qb abg nccebnpu sebz qverpgyl nobir pnpur, pbzr va sebz rnfg, nybat obggbz bs fgrrcrfg fybcr.