The Gorsey

Droves of tourists every year drive to the shores of Loch Ness to catch an elusive glimpse of the monster that waits at the bottom of the Loch, but what you may not know is that you don't have to travel quite that far to be in the presence of a “water beast”

Cwtched in-between the Brecon Beacons and the Black Mountains is the beautiful village of Llangorse.

Llangorse boasts the largest fresh water lake in South Wales

The lake is famous for its fishing (the biggest Pike in the UK was caught in these very waters), for water sports and being the only place in Wales that you will be able to see a Crannog, it is a site of exceptional beauty and has a SSI designation, if that isn't enough deep within the dark waters awaits another hidden treasure “Gorsey”.

Gorsey is said to be an Afnac (if you’re not quite up to speed with your readings of the Mabinogion, an Afnac would be more commonly referred to as a lake monster)

One of the earliest descriptions of it is given by the 15th-century poet Lewys Glyn Cothi, who described it as living in Llyn Syfaddon, now Llangorse Lake.

It is said that King Arthur killed the last Afnac at Llyn Barfog in Snowdonia some time ago, there is a hoof-print etched deep into the rock of Carn March Arthur "Stone of Arthur's Horse", which was made by King Arthur's trusty steed Llamrei, when it was hauling the Afnac from the lake…

yet it seems that King Arthur missed our Afnac out…

Gorsey is said to be a monstrous creature who preys upon anyone who falls or swims in its lake.

The last report of an incident involving Gorsey was reported in 1999 when a water skier had a close encounter with the beast leaving him with a nasty bite mark on his foot. The beast allegedly had quite a chomp out of the water-skier before diving back down into the deep waters and hiding in one of the many underground caverns.

It seems the beast has abated his hunger for now (we would suggest that this is in probably a direct result of the plethora of Mouth Watering establishments that Gorsey now has to visit in the area, if you had the option of some famous hot cawl or the foot of a water skier we know which we would choose) as the lake has been festooned with boats, skiers and swimmers since that have had no reports of Gorsey grabbing or nibbling at them.