The woodland haven for farewells and memories

Richard Youle, local democracy reporter

Heading north from Carmarthen you drive through a steep valley with the Afon Gwili flowing past and ascend towards Rhos where the landscape opens up and, after passing through the village, a left turn takes you to a remote woodland.

In that woodland lie around 50 people – all loved ones to many. Hundreds more are expected to join them.

Keith Hall, who runs Bargoed Natural Burials with his mother, emerges from the trees a couple of minutes after I arrive. It’s very quiet, very green and very wet underfoot. It’s Carmarthenshire, after all.

History

Keith’s parents moved to the area from Gloucestershire 28 years ago when he was two and managed their land predominantly for wildlife. His father doesn’t live there any more but Keith and his mother, Sally, who has planted thousands of trees, have grown the burial business since gaining planning permission from the county council at the end of 2019.

Keith said: “At the time I was quitting my job and my mother said, ‘Do you want to try and set it up?’ The main issue was the planning.”

Not many 25-year-olds, as Keith was then, fill in an planning application form and arrange groundwater and drainage reports – very few do so for a burial site application.

“It came back to us (from the planning department) a couple of times to re-do,” said Keith, now 30. “We got planning permission, and had our first burial in February 2020 just before the Covid lockdown. That was quite a nice one – a friend of my mother’s friend. They didn’t want anything big, they wanted it to be ‘DIY’.”

The burials take place among seven acres of woodland and wildflower meadow – land which was previously permanent pasture. There is scope to extend to an adjacent 13 acres subject to planning consent.

Keith said the area currently being used could accommodate up to 500 burials, a small proportion of which would be caskets with ashes inside rather than conventional graves. “We’ve already got about 100 pre-booked plots, including one person in her late 20s,” he said. “It can take the weight off people’s minds.”

Natural

More people are choosing natural burials over cremations and cemetery burials, according to the Association of Natural Burial Grounds, a membership group run by a charity called the Natural Death Centre.

“There are more natural burial sites opening every year and most of our members report a slow but steady increase in numbers year on year,” Rosie Inman-Cook, who manages both organisations.

She said private natural burials were usually cheaper – sometimes a lot cheaper – and avoided the greenhouse gas emissions associated with cremation. “A far better cycle of life, as many customers put it,” she said.

The idea for Bargoed Natural Burials came after friends of Mrs Hall were looking for a natural burial site for a relative of theirs. The two nearest, said Keith, were in Ceredigion and Swansea. “Since we’ve opened there is one in Pembrokeshire,” he said.

While his mother focuses on the admin side of the businesses, Keith shows people round and assists their neighbour and gravedigger Mick Bellwood during a burial. “He has been a Godsend,” said Keith.

Some families, he said, have a funeral director, others a celebrant, while others do the officiating themselves. “Some people really like a DIY funeral,” he said. “We will just assist with what’s needed.”

We are talking while seated in a semi-enclosed shed, made by woodland manager and bench maker Bryn Dafys, before Keith leads me on a tour. Every now and then a grassy hump appears among the trees, or a stone plaque flush with the ground denoting someone’s name, year of birth and year of death. We are among the dead. Small wooden posts mark a pre-booked plot.

Wildlife

Keith talks passionately about the native trees that are present. There are 21 species – among them oak, rowan and spindle with its square trim and bright orange seed case. “It’s beautiful – one of my favourite trees,” he said.

Bramble and blackthorn has to be cleared from time to time. A small patch of yellow ragwort is maintained to attract cinnabar moths but it’s not allowed to spread. Dragonflies and a heron have located a new pond. “I have seen hares and we get a lot of buzzards and red kites,” said Keith. “There are lots of birds.”

Embalmed bodies cannot be accepted due to chemicals potentially leaching into groundwater. Coffins and shrouds must be biodegradable and contain no plastics, and simple wooden benches can be provided in areas where there currently aren’t any.

Keith works two days a week as a support worker and said he had no regrets building up the burial business outside of that. “It’s so rewarding, helping people,” he said. “The feedback has been really good. We are very open about how we work. We try to do as much or as little as a family wants. Obviously it’s a very difficult time for people.”

The woodland and wildflower meadow built up and managed by Keith and his mother are part of the new National Forest for Wales, and it’s open to the public to have a wander round. A standard burial plot is £750 and there is a £450 charge for funeral administration, mapping of the grave location and certifying the grave-digging and burial.

Memories

Among those buried there are Stephen Townsend, who was 72 when he lost his battle to cancer in April this year – but not before he walked his daughter Poppy down the aisle.

“We were absolute soul-mates,” said Stephen’s partner Jenny Ingall. The pair met around 40 years ago and had children from previous relationships. “The first time I saw him, I just knew,” she said. “He was standing there with his long hair. It was such an attraction.”

Jenny, 70, described Stephen as a brilliant guitarist who could also turn his hand to carpentry. She believed he was talented enough to have gone far in a band. “He didn’t have the drive to earn money though,” she said.

Jenny, of Abercych, north-east Pembrokeshire, described the burial ground as a beautiful place. “It was so amazing to find,” she said. “I wanted somewhere I could go and be quiet and be in nature. I think I looked online, and then I talked to Sally (Keith’s mother) and just clicked with her. She was brilliant at preparing us.”

She said she showed Stephen photos of the site as he was too unwell to visit. “He knew where it was, and he knew the views,” she said. “I think it put his mind to rest. We bought two plots so we would be next to each other.”

At the funeral songs Stephen had written, including one called Blue Jenny, were played along with tracks such as Pink Floyd’s Comfortably Numb and Jimi Hendrix’s version of Bob Dylan’s All Along the Watchtower. Their six children, plus grandchildren and great-grandchildren were there. “It was a lovely atmosphere,” said Jenny. “The local pub where we live had offered to do a funeral wake, but we went home and had cake and sandwiches and tea.

“The first time I went to visit him (after the funeral) I was so exhausted I sat down next to the grave and fell asleep. When I go there I walk for about half an hour through the meadows. No-one bothers you.”

Right option

Jenny said natural burials wouldn’t be for everybody. But it was the right option for her and Stephen. “I often take my watercolour paints and sit quietly sketching – it’s so peaceful,” she said.

Also buried there is Amanda Freeman, known as Bibi. Born in 1956 in Belfast she grew up in West Wales and later lived in London. She was a graphic designer, a costume designer and became a face-painter, working at huge sporting events such as the 2012 London Olympics.

She left London to return to Wales and after a long search moved to a house across the valley from Bargoed Natural Burials, where she looked after 10 cats and a Dalmation. Her son, Daniel Freeman, said the spot where she was laid to rest was perfect. “She picked it, and the burial went perfectly,” he said.

Daniel said there were oak trees about as tall as him in that particular location. “It’s going to be a really lovely forest,” he said.

Keith, meanwhile, said the use of the land as a natural burial site would make it nigh-on impossible to develop, meaning the graves and the trees and the biodiversity would be protected. “If it ever leaves the family, it will be in a trust,” he said.

His affinity with the land is clear. An only child who was home-schooled and who has a rescue salmon-crested cockatoo called Kooke, Keith seems very much at peace in the surroundings. “It means everything, really – it’s the only home I’ve ever known,” he said. “The community here is great. Events happen locally quite regularly – open mic nights, plant festivals.”

Keith said the burial site, which last year won a UK people’s award organised by a group called Natural Burials Grounds, pretty much paid for itself and that he hadn’t sought grant funding via the National Forest for Wales.

His mother, Sally, works two-and-a-half days a week for a not-for-profit organisation promoting low-impact construction called the Association for Environment Conscious Building, which she and her husband set up in 1989. She also said the natural burials work was very rewarding.

“It’s one of the best jobs I have done,” said the 66-year-old. “People are very appreciative. They can have what they want, and it’s lovely seeing how pleased they are when they realise they can take it much more into their own hands. It becomes really special and really personal.”

My time at Bargoed Natural Burials was coming to an end. I asked Keith if he had picked a quiet spot where he might want to be laid to rest. “I haven’t chosen a plot yet but I’m keeping my eye out,” he replied.

As we say our goodbyes sunshine breaks through the murk and the trees and sky seem to glow. Worse places to end up, I think – but hopefully not this Christmas.