The Garw Valley is situated just 12 miles north of Bridgend, part of the South Wales Coalfield. Geographically it is a dead end.
This valley once had no fewer than 6 working coal mines, these were Lluest 1880-1902, Ffaldau 1877-1985, Darren 1880-1902, Glenavon 1903-1959, International/Carn 1893-1967 Garw/Ocean 1893-1985. These pits plus a few drift mines accumulated a lot of waste with the quest for coal. All this waste/slag was dumped within the valley at first and when the sides were full it was deposited on the tops of the surrounding mountains.
Reclamation of these areas began in 1989, this firstly entailed the removal of the mountain tips, a huge washery was constructed on the mountain to facilitate the sorting of useable coal from the waste, this coal was brought down the mountain and put into coal trucks to be taken by train down the valley for use at Margam Steelworks. Once these top tips were removed, work began on landscaping the tips on the sides of the valley that were closer to the houses. In these cases the tips were not removed entirely, merely distributed in other parts of the valley by virtue of heavy landscaping machinery.
The reclamation people were responsible for the four new lakes, two at the top where the Ocean/Garw colliery was, One is dedicated to Daniel James who wrote Calon Lan, He lived and worked locally for a time and two lower lakes down the valley, also a Community pathway from Pontycymmer to Blaengarw