Staying with my grandparents, on fine days we would walk from their house in Caegawr, past Scoffers fish and chip shop (Corned beef pies a speciality) to the playground down the valley. By the road was Dyffryn Woods, a tiny, dark and mean patch of trees, home to a mysterious stone circle of weather beaten monoliths. I was only young, and assumed it was from ancient, Celtic times, when learned druids performed complex and magical rituals. Later, I discovered it was all a fake, constructed at the turn of the century to provide some authentic history for the coming Eisteddfod. On the way back, by the new rugby field we would pass the stone winding gear commemorating the site of Deep Dyffryn, once the deepest pit in Wales. And I would wonder how it all looked ten years previously, when men like my grandfather still worked underground. But best of all, we would climb high up the mountain over the town to reach the Rocking Stone. And so first we would walk Through overgrown allotments at the very top of Allen Street, past abandoned garages with decaying forgotten cars. And immediately then came steep slopes of damp grass and bracken, (though punctuated by the rusted remains of old and discarded machinery) - The high openness was so different to the smoke and grime of the town emitted by the smokeless fuel works along the valley at Abercwmboi. Look from Penrhiceiber over to Aberdare - countless straight rows of terraced houses, the factories and sculpted slagheaps, the Workman??????s Institute, and more hills On the other side of the valley. A crowd makes their way to a rugby match, while somewhere in the magnificent view my grandparents are watching for us. We look down in silence, rest a while, then continue up towards to the summit. High above the stagnant dirt of the town we see a multitude of wimberries, waiting to be picked.