During our original crowdfunding campaign, we successfully raised £5,993 with 126 wonderful supporters. We are now continuing to accept donations to keep repairs going. Find out more about our original plans below.
Welcome to the Mend Our Mountains Bâl Mawr appeal.
We're trying to raise £7,000 for Bâl-Mawr in the Brecon Beacons - this path up to a popular summit in the Black Mountains has become badly eroded, damaging a precious habitat. We need your help to raise £7,000 that will enable us to to train volunteers and carry out vital path repairs.
Rugged hills
The Black Mountains are a mountain range in the east of the Brecon Beacons National Park known for its flowing ridges, glacial valleys and rich history.
The summit of Bâl Mawr sits above the beautiful Llanthony Priory, and as such is a well-walked hill. It is also a much-frequented route for walkers of the well-known Beacons Way.
The Black Mountains are also popular with Duke of Edinburgh Award participants who use the hills to learn and practice their skills. Bâl-Mawr attracts a large number of walkers every year, with its rounded summit offering panoramic views across the Brecon Beacons National Park, as well as into Powys and the English Midlands.
The problem
Monitoring of upland path conditions throughout the Brecon Beacons National Park reveals that this path has deteriorated markedly due to its popularity with walkers heading up from Llanthony Abbey and Bal Bach. The footpaths around the summit of Bâl Mawr are severely eroded and the combined impact of feet and weather is damaging the Site of Special Scientific Interest and protected wet heath habitat.
The solution - and what your pledge will do
The park authority would like to halt further erosion, whilst still remaining sympathetic to the surrounding environment. This can be achieved by actually reducing the path’s width, implementing stone pitching on steeper sections, and laying gravel to create a clear footpath. If walkers are encouraged to stick to the marked path, further damage to the bog habitat in which it sits will be decreased or stopped altogether.
The work will be carried out by the National Parks Upland Volunteers and part of the grant will be used to support these volunteers to carry out the work needed to repair the route. This in turn will improve the visitor experience by giving a clear path to follow to access the summit of Bâl Mawr.
Incredible rewards
To help us reach this total (and those in our other Mend Our Mountains projects) we're working with a huge number of partners, many of whom have made incredibly kind donations - you can see some of them below.
It means we can offer an amazing range of rewards - from t-shirts and mugs to unique experiences. You can see all of these, some of which are exclusive to the Brecon Beacons, on the right. We think there's something for everyone, on any kind of budget, and we've worked hard to make sure our partners are offering you something really great in return for your valuable pledge.
And it's not just about the Brecon Beacons. As you've probably guessed, Mend Our Mountains is a huge campaign, spanning the entire family of 15 UK National Parks. We've got 13 primary projects in 11 parks, and every park will benefit in some way. Crowdfunding is just part of what we're doing - we want to raise £1,000,000 in total, the most ambitious campaign of its type ever.
If you want to take a look at all the projects in the appeal, and see how close we're getting to our overall target, check out the Mend Our Mountains Crowdfunder Homepage.
Pledge today and protect Bâl Mawr for the future.
Reward Images
Organic cotton Mend Our Mountain tees. Sizes shown: Men’s Medium, Women’s Small