Cycling Constitution Hill, Swansea, Wales
Well, what do we have to say about Greatest British Cycling Climbs #100? Stah-EEEEEPPPPP!!! Enough said! This one reminds us of our great San Francisco adventure where we climbed the 10 steepest hills in that iconic city.
Cobbles all the way.
Beautiful view of Swansea Bay from the climb’s top.
This climb is so short (300 meters) you can see the finish from the start of the climb. This is the shortest, but also among the steepest at 21%, of the GCC 100.
Simon Warren writes of this Welsh climb:
“Hidden in the heart of Swansea lies the infamous Constitution Hill, an excellently preserved and immaculately maintained cobbled climb just waiting to give you hell. The legality of climbing the hill may be questioned -- no entry signs at the bottom of the bollards preventing entry at the top suggest your shouldn’t, but it’s an essential climb for all cyclists to conquer” (100 Greatest Cycling Climbs, A Road Cyclists Guide to Britain’s Hills, Simon Warren, 2010, pp. 168-169).
Handrails to assist walking on the steep grade.
This climb is in the heart of Swansea, a coastal city (pop. 245,000, 2016), once the world’s leading copper-smelting area:
“Swansea is a coastal city and county, officially known as the City and County of Swansea (Welsh: Dinas a Sir Abertawe) in Wales. During the 19th-century industrial heyday, Swansea was a key centre of the copper industry, earning the nickname Copperopolis,” (Swansea).
And, with the completion of Constitution Hill, that’s a wrap! From 100 Greatest Cycling Climbs #1 (Cheddar Gorge) to #100 (Constitution Hill), we’ve done them all. What an amazing adventure through a kingdom steeped in history. We comfortably completed the GCC 100 in 35 days in late August through late September 2018. An adventure we will surely never forget.