Plasdraw is on the western side of Aberdare, towards Trecynon. In the Middle Ages the upland routes through the Cynon valley were used by pilgrims crossing to the shrine of Our Lady at Penrhys, above the Rhondda, or to the Cistercian abbey at Margam on the coast.
In October 2013, in a thread on the AberdareOnline forum inviting local ghost stories, a regular contributor wrote that there were "stories around of phantom monks in the Plasdraw area of Aberdare", explained by a belief that a rest house for those pilgrims had once stood there. The same person remembered reports some years earlier that the St David's centre, next to the Wetherspoons pub in the town, was haunted, and that the old Aberdare hospital had "strange appearances within its walls and grounds".
The forum post gives no witnesses, dates or descriptions, and we do not know of evidence for a pilgrims' hostel at Plasdraw. It is recorded as a thin local tradition.
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