Carneddau Wild Camping
Intro
With a weekend pass and a new Terra Nova Laser Competition tent to try out I headed up to Snowdonia for a couple of days walking and a night of wild camping.
I arrived at Ogwen Cottage YHA about 11pm on Friday night and parked the van in the almost deserted car park, next to three guys in a winnebago. After a spot of dinner and a beer (courtesy of the guys next to me), I laid out the sleeping mat (Alpkit Airic) and the sleeping bag (Alpkit PD400) in the bag of the van and managed a fairly comfortable nights sleep.
Saturday morning and I breakfasted on a hot cup of Mountain Fuel, which was marginally better than the cold ones I had tried during the 3 peaks challenge at the beginning of June. I repacked my kit and was ready to set off. Pen yr Ole Wen towered upwards on the opposite side of the road. The previous night I had seen torches coming down the ridge so presumed that there must be a fairly easy to follow path up there, and having been up the East ridge, via Glan Dena and Clogwyn Mawr twice earlier in the year (once in January in the snow and once in May in the mist), I had decided to try an ascent via the South ridge anyway.
The plan was then to proceed round to Carnedd Dafydd and Carnedd Llewelyn before heading north towards Foel Grach. If time allowed I was considering a jaunt towards Garnedd Uchaf before trying to find somewhere to camp between Foel Grach and the head of Afon Eigau. The plan for Sunday was to ascend to the ridge between Pen yr Helgi Du and Pen Llithrig y Wrach before ascending the latter for a view of Llyn Cowlyd Reservoir. Then heading down to the reservoir and following the path South West back to the A5 and ultimately back to Ogwen.
In total, about 15 miles. A map of the route can be seen here. And all the photos can be seen on my Flickr site here.
Saturday morning
Crossing the road from the YHA I found a stile over the wall and a short scramble took me on to the path that led towards the heights of Pen yr Ole Wen. The path was easy to follow as it zig zagged up the ridge. Then came a fairly treacherous bit of scree, which still held a well worn path that led into the rocks. A short bit of hard scrambling then bought me out on to the rocks that gradually gave way to the grassy patch to the south west of the summit.
On the summit was a chap in an orange high vis vest, marshalling the sea to summit race. A race for teams of four from the coast to the summit of Snowdon, via the Carneddau, the Glyders and finally Snowdon itself.
A panorama of the view from Pen yr Ole Wen. The grey rocky summit just to right of center is Carnedd Dafydd.
After a couple of photos I left the summit and followed the path to the north west and around to the cairn at Carnedd Fach. From there it was relatively easy (at least easier than it had been earlier in the year in the mist) to follow the path to the summit of Carnedd Dafydd. A short break in the shelter there before heading east along Cefn Ysgolion Duon towards Carnedd Llewelyn.
With all the time in the world I knew that if I kept on going I would reach Foel Grach before lunch, so I took some time to find a sheltered spot just off the ridge and just sat and admired the scenery of the valley extending north from the ridge.
The view from Cefn Ysgolion Duon
From the end of Cefn Ysgolion Duon I headed in a more northerly direction and ascended towards the summit of Carnedd Llewelyn. The actual summit was very windy and all the shelters were full of people, so I headed down the north slope a bit until I found a patch of grass surrounded by rocks and again I stopped for a break and to admire the scenery.
As I sat there I heard, and then saw, three black guys pass to my right, loudly debating racial politics. I let them carry on ahead and only started down the slope towards Foel Grach when I saw that they had started the ascent from the col towards the summit of Foel Grach. But somehow I still managed to catch up with them just as they reached the summit of Garnedd Uchaf. They still hadn’t finished arguing and asked me what I saw when I looked at one of them. Did I see an Englishman or a black guy who may have been English. Since he said he had a British passport I replied that he must be English (or at least British) and he just happened to be black. That seemed to prove a point for one of them but they continued to argue the matter as they walked off. They invited me to walk with them but I had decided to try to locate the wells that are shown on the map about 200m north west of the pile of stones on the summit.
I followed a bearing for 132 paces and came to some rocks that obviously marked the two wells, but they were completely dry. The only water on the summit was a stagnant pool and there was no way I was going to take water from that. I hadn’t run out of water, but knew that I must be getting low. I had drunk the glucose drink from the SIS bottle that I had made up that morning and had used some of the 3 litres from the bladder to make the Mountain Fuel breakfast. So I was fairly keen to find some water reasonably soon.
Peat bogs and Sphagnum Moss
I retraced my steps back to the summit of Garnedd Uchaf and headed down the slop towards Foel Grach once more. On my way north from Foel Grach I had noticed a path heading off to the left (north west), which was obviously well used and marked by a cairn. According to the map there should also be a path heading South East that intercepted the main ridge path at the same spot. However, when I reached the cairn there was no sign of the path that I wanted to take.
So, I headed off into the tussocky grass, following my nose really. I knew I wanted to skirt around the summit of Foel Grach and head South East towards the rocks just to the west of Craig-fawr. I thought that if I dropped down the slope a bit I might find one of the three streams marked on the map that drain eastwards.
The ground was fairly easy going, with a few ankle turning tussocks but not too bad, and it all seemed fairly dry.
However, I soon learnt, or relearnt, about sphagnum moss and its water absorbent properties. All of the moss I had come across so far had been dry, so I was strolling along when suddenly I felt my foot go squelch as my shoe filled with water! I had found a clump of sphagnum that was far from dry and my nice comfortable ventilated shoes had let in a load of water. Fortunately I was able to step across that piece and fairly soon the water had drained out of my shoe and I could feel my foot drying off.
Unfortunately, I soon found larger patches of moss and some fairly boggy ground and my feet got wet again. However, I took this as a good sign as it must mean that there was a fair amount of water near by. Sure enough I found water seeping out of the side of the mountain from a nice little spring and trickling down in a very narrow rivulet. It was barely a centimetre deep and quite muddy, so there was no chance of filling my bladder from it. However, I followed the stream down hill a little way and it widened into a gurgling stream cascading over rocks.
I was able to find a small water fall in an opening in the ground took some time to fill up my bladder, make up some more glucose drink and let my shoes and socks dry off.
A Piece of Paradise
I was now level with the rocks to the west of Criag-fawr. I managed to step from rock to rock and so avoid most of the boggy ground that surrounded the rocks. From there I headed south east down the shoulder towards Gledrfford. As the ground levelled out I turned directly south until I was overlooking the Cwm Eigau. From there I could see the slope was covered in reeds that could well mark more boggy ground. So, I kept above them and turned west to follow the contour lines. I crossed one small stream and carried on until I came to the head of Afon Eigau, which is the furthest left of the three streams in the above map.
Looking down the stream I saw that the stream had eroded a narrow, vertically sided chasm into the hillside. A small waterfall cascaded over the rocks and the sides and bottom of the chasm were filled with lush green trees and bushes. In winter it is probably a raging torrent or a sheet of ice, but in June it was a picturesque piece of paradise.
I climbed down into the chasm and followed the stream down another small waterfall. From there it dropped dramatically but I was able to cross to the other side and pull myself up through the Bilberry bushes so that I could follow its western bank down the slope. The ground levelled off a bit and I found a reasonably level piece of ground next to a boulder that was obviously used by the sheep as a shelter, and may have seen some human habitation as one end of the opening had been closed up with a number of rocks piled on each other.
By this stage it was getting on for about four pm. My shoes and socks were still damp, the ends of my trousers felt a bit wet from all the boggy ground and wet moss, but more worryingly was the waist of my trousers were soaking wet. Fearing a hole in my water bladder and wanting to dry off I sheltered next to the rock and stripped off all my clothes and unpacked my bag.
I whiled away the time it took for all my kit to dry by exploring the area a bit. I wandered up the stream and took some photos of the water fall and the hidden pool.
As the evening wore on I pitched the tent and ate a light supper, before retiring to bed around 7pm (I know what a lightweight).
I woke around 10pm to see the moon appearing over the mountains. It was a fantastic red colour. Some time around midnight I got out of the tent to answer the call of nature to see that the moon was now the normal brilliant white and I watched as a flare from a satellite tracked across the sky. I finally went to bed again, expecting an early rise with the morning sun.
Day 2 Sunday and a change in the weather
When I woke up on Sunday morning I was surprised to see that the time was around 6am. With sunrise a couple of hours earlier I thought I would have been woken up much earlier. However, as I emerged from the tent I saw the reason for my lie in. Instead of the glorious blue skies of Saturday the sky was hidden by dark and threatening clouds, while streams of mist were blowing vigorously over the ridge. Expecting a sudden downpour, I rapidly packed my bags while I boiled some water for a cup of coffee and after a hasty breakfast I shouldered the pack and headed down the hill.
The morning was chilly and very windy, so I had started with a fleece on, but the exertions of getting down the hill soon warmed me up and I stopped briefly to change the fleece for my new Haglofs windshirt.
On reaching the valley floor I crossed the stream and followed a sheep path round the base of the old mine works. According to the map there is a boundary and a fence running up the slope to the col between Pen yr Helgi Du and Pen Llithrig y Wrach. I had planned to ascend via this wall, which is the other side of the large buttress just to left of center in the photo below.
However, as I followed the sheep trail past the mine works (which are in the shadows in the bottom right of the image), I started to climb the side of the valley until I was just below the outcrop of rock to the left of the shadow line. Then, as it their way, the sheep track suddenly stopped and I was faced with a very stiff, arduous climb through the heather to the ridge.
I climbed the slope of heather in the middle of this photo, between the two outcrops of rock.
On reaching the ridge coming down off Pen yr Helgi Du I contemplated the ascent of Pen Llithrig y Wrach. However, the cloud was still streaming over the summit and the wind was still blowing hard. Aware of the precipitous drop on the far side I decided not to risk it, but to descend to the road. On my previous trip, just as we had done in January, I had come down to the left (east of the stream) draining Cwm Tal-y-braich. So, this time I decided to descend via the west bank. And I’m glad I did as the going was much easier and I was soon at the Leet.
I followed the Leet westwards until it met the tarmac track that led down to the A5. From there it was only a couple of kilometres back to the car park at Ogwen cottage, where the guys in the Winnebago were cooking a fried breakfast. Of course, by the time I had descended to the road the wind had died down, the sky had cleared and the summit of Pen Llithrig y Wrach was now bathed in sunshine. Oh well, there is always another day.
Lessons Learnt
The climb up the north slope of Pen yr Helgi Du was a real killer, an almost vertical ascent through heather that seemed to take an age. In future I will stick to ridges if possible.
The tent and the new sleeping bag were great, but I should have tried lying on the ground before pitching the tent, then I would have found the lump that ended up under my head.
Carl Sprake 