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Welsh 3 Day Expedition
Introduction
As part of my drive to rack up the sufficient number of Quality Mountain Days for me to consider going for the ML Assessment, I need to do a number of wild camps. I have done a couple of walks that included a single night of wild camping but wanted to push myself a bit harder and do a three day / two night expedition. I also wanted to explore another area of Snowdonia National Park.
I’ve been a fan of Geoff and Vivien’s website at http://v-g.me.uk for a while now and used their route around the South Arenigs as inspiration for this expedition.
Monday 17th September
Fortunately I was working from home today so was able to get away nice and early. I managed to leave home at about 5.45 arriving at the campsite at Bwch yn Uchaf at about 21.45. It was dark from about Shrewsbury and wet from Oswestry / Llangollen, with really heavy rain as I arrived at the campsite. Met by Stan the night watch man who told me more than I wanted to know about the campsite.
Tuesday 18th September
There were several showers during the night but I managed to sleep well. I was up and ready to go by 9.15am. The campsite is right next to the end of the Bala light railway and, despite being laden down with my rucksack, I took a small diversion on to the platform to take a couple of photos of the train waiting at the platform.
The first major obstacle of the day was the green lane. Nettles, brambles and an iron gate made it impassable at the start so I skirted around the edge of the farmer’s field, dropping back into the green lane when I could and walking along the edge of the field when I needed to. It was while I was in the green lane that I was almost buzzed by a buzzard, as the bird flew into the tunnel like green lane, only a few metres ahead of me. There was wildlife everywhere, including ravens and big hairy caterpillars crawling across the wet moss.
Approaching the lone cottage at Castell I was aware of an electronic alarm coming from the house, but there was no sign of any recent human habitation.
Passing into the Y Lordship forest I followed the forest track. In amongst the trees the ground was covered by huge swathes of deep green lush moss, with various fungi poking through.
Moss in Y Lordship Forest
Emerging from the forest I turned left on to the road and then through a gate onto a bridleway that crossed the forest. It was hard enough making my way through the long grass of the bridleway, but as the track emerged onto the moorland it got even harder as I got my first real taste of the heather and sphagnum bogs.
Looking across the heather tussocks and sphagnum moss bogs, with Arenig Faw in the back ground.
Made it to the planned campsite very early, so pushed on and summited Arenig Fawr, where I managed a self portrait next to the memorial plaque and small collection of debris from the USAF Flying Fortress that crashed onto the mountain on the 4th August 1943. From the summit shelter I watched as an RAF training jet flew up the valley, just above the ground and well below me.
Since it was still very early (I had made it to the summit by 14.30) I was debating pushing on from the planned campsite to the foot of Moel Llyfnant or perhaps even further. However, descending from the summit I met two guys coming up who were obviously familiar with the area. They warned that the pass was always damp and there would be more shelter on Arenig Fawr than at the foot of Moel Llyfnant. I therefore headed back to the original campsite and had pitched tent my tent by 15.45.
Lying in the tent, sheltered from the wind it was really quite warm as the late afternoon sun bathed the tent. However, after dinner, as the sun set behind Moel Llyfnant it started to cool off quite a bit and it began to rain. Between the showers the summit was really beautifully stunning in the late evening sun.
Arenig Fawr in the evening sun.
Cooked dinner of cream of chicken soup, beef casserole and sponge and custard pudding. The latter could have done with longer to heat through but all were very tasty.
Snuggling down in my sleeping bag it was just me, a few sheep munching on grass near by and the sound of the mountain fairies running through the grass and whistling through the rocks. Or was that the wind, or just my imagination?
Settled down to get some sleep at about 18.15. since it was still light I used my Buff as a blindfold and was soon asleep. Waking in the night I lay listening to the noises of the mountain at night. Was that a foot fall in the grass, or just a passing sheep? Or was it just the wind? It felt like the middle of the night. In fact, it was only ten to eleven. My blood sugar felt a bit low, so I had a couple of flapjacks, pulled on my long johns as I was feeling a bit chilly and was soon fast asleep again.
Wednesday 19th September
Finally decided to get up at about 7.45, so that must have been about 12 hours sleep I had on top of the mountain! My left contact lens took ages to get in, but luckily the right one went in first go. The midnight snack must have been a good idea because my blood sugar this morning was ideal at 5.5. I decided to get up, pack most of the gear away and have breakfast while the tent was airing – there was a lot of condensation inside.
I got underway by 9.15 and even with a stop to resupply with water from a stream I made it to the summit of Moel Llyfnant in less than an hour.
On the summit of Moel Llyfnant sheltering from the wind
From Moel Llyfnant I headed north west, following the north edge of a forest to Moel Slates, from where there was a fantastic view of the Snowdon range to the north.
The Snowdon range from Moel Slates
From Moel Slates I followed the ridge south to Bwlch y Bi and on to Foel Boeth. From there it was South East to Pen y Feidiog and from there into the Coed Y Brenin forest.
There is a reason why people don’t use open access land as much as some organisations might hope for, its because when there are no footpaths to follow it can be blooming hard going trying to make your way across knee deep, ankle twisting heather tussocks and sphagnum moss. When farmers build and mend fences where there is no public right of way, it can make it difficult, if not impossible to follow the planned route.
Having managed to fight my way out of the Coed Y Brenin wood I made my way down the valley side towards Cwm Hasgen. According to the map there should be foot bridge and a ford over the stream. Unfortunately I couldn’t find either and therefore had to find my own way across the fast flowing stream. The original plan was to camp about 1km to the north of Rhobell Fawr and attempt to summit it on Thursday. However, as I followed the Nant yr Helyg along the side of the forest, heading towards Llechwedd Llynn I encountered a repaired wall and fence that was too high to safely cross. I therefore retreated slightly and followed the footpath south through the forest.
Reaching the southern edge of the forest I followed the signposted firebreaks through the forest to the southern slopes of Dduallt. It was getting late in the day and it was a deceptively long climb to the summit, with several false tops but the views from the top made it worthwhile. As I descended northwards I started looking for somewhere to camp. From the ridge I could see that the northern part of the forest to the east had been cleared and would not offer any camping opportunities, as I was hoping for. So somewhere sheltered was needed on this side of the open marshy area. As the fence line dropped to a low point I crossed to a less steeply sloping grassy area, sheletered from the wind. By now it was getting very late and the sky was looking very threatning, so I picked a spot and pitched the tent.
Unfortuantely, what had looked like a reasonable area for the tent turned out to slope in all the wrong directions and have a blooming great big rock in the middle. To add to my woes I had used the last of my gas to heat a cup of coffee for breakfast so had to make do with a cold sausage casserole and a cold custard pudding.
It was a long and uncomfortable night with lots of rain and strong wind, despite the shletered position.
Thursday 20th September
According to my watch sunrise was due around 6.40 this morning and it did seem to start to get light from about 5.30am. I got my contact lenses in by headtorch light and soon had everything packed up apart from the tent. The rain held off long enough for me to get out the tent to do up my boots and put on my gaiters and waterproof trousers, but the rain came down as I packed up the tent and despite the adage to start off cold I didn’t want to faff about taking off my fleece that I had on under my waterproof jacket. Looking back, maybe I should have put the waterproof jacket on over my baselayer and then put the synthetic down jacket over the top.
I managed to recross the stream that had resulted in wet feet the night before without incident and found the fence line leading east. It was a slow steady trudge through large tussocks of heather and the omnipresent sphagnum moss bog. The original plan was to follow the ridge up Cerrig yr lwrch but given the wind and the rain I must admit that couldn’t see the point and so kept to the footpath that follows Afon Ffwy. I was looking for the footbridge to enable me to head across to the Nan Ty Coch. The stream was about six feet wide, several feet deep and was flowing very fast through a well cut channel. The bridge did not fill me with confidence, a rectangle of wooden poles covered with rusty corrugated steel. Three of the poles had slid from their original position, leaving the surface at an awkward angle. I had no choice but to go for it. Trying to keep my feet over the one pole remaining in position I placed the tips of my walking poles in holes in the corrugated surface to stop them slipping.
The corrugated foot bridge
I made it across safely and followed the obvious track down the hill. Approaching a ladder stile over a wall I was focusing more on the stile than where I was walking and managed to get a very wet foot by stepping up to my calf in to a stream. I followed the path to the farm below Graig ddu. I wanted to follow the footpath north to Ty Coch and then on to the road. However, the map showed the footpath crossing the stream in a small wood. I managed to find where a stile had been but there was no sign of a path beyond the stile. So, I went into the next field and crossed into the wood where there was less vegetation. The wood covers the steep slopes either side of the stream and the ground was very wet and slippery. I managed to make it safely down to the stream and crossed with the help of some fallen trunks in the water.
The far side was even more slippery with low branches impeding my progress so I pushed straight up and crossed the fence onto a track, rather than try and follow the route of the footpath through the woods. From Ty Coch I was able to follow a new footpath east. This came out on to a tarmac road after about 400 metres. I was able to follow this down to the minor road and then stomp back to Llanuwchllyn.
The full collection of photos can be seen on my Flickr page.
Wales – 2 weekends on the trot
PYB
At the beginning of April we were up at our favourite North Wales location, well mine anyway – Plas-y-Brenin. This time it was for a Discover Mountain Biking course. We had a great weekend, and although the main purpose was for D to become more confident off road, I have to admit that I learnt a lot as well, and had a great time.
All my photos from the weekend can be seen on my Flickr site here.
Putting it into Practice
Keen to put our new found mountain biking skills into practice we planned to head back to Wales the following weekend – Easter. The original plan was to travel up on the Thursday night to give us Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday in Wales. However, even with me working from home on the Thursday it was a big ask to get everything together. I therefore rang the campsite to let them know that we would still be going but would be there Friday instead. The campsite, Celyn Brithion , was appreciative but laid back.
Rather than travel up to the Snowdon area again, and face the hordes of tourists tramping along the motorway around the Snowdon summits, I wanted to explore some of the other areas of the National Park. So, I had looked to the South East and found Dinas Mawyddy, complete with a decent summit – Aran Fawddwy.
Friday
Having arrived at the campsite in the early afternoon we went for a short walk to stretch our legs.
The overiding memory of the walk must be: “Sheep”, or, more accurately, “Lambs”. They were everywhere, some of them were obviously very very young, as evidenced by the presence of afterbirth on the track and long remnants of umbilical cords hanging from the lambs.
This short circular route can be seen on Trailzilla.
While research the town of Minllyn we found reference to the Brigands Inn, about a mile down the road. We headed down there for a meal and were very disappointed. D had a burger that was fairly tasteless and there was so much dressing on the salad that the plate was swimming in it and the bun was soaking. I had steak, and despite talking to the waitress about how I wanted it cooked it came back overcooked. Basically the trouble seemed to be that the chef was trying to do too much and be too fancy.
Saturday
Saturday we decided to head out on the mountain bikes, to try to put into practice some of the skills we had learnt the previous weekend at Plas Y Brenin and to build on our new found confidence. I had pored over the maps to find bridleways for us to u se and come up with a circular route from a picnic spot up a side road from the small village of Corris.
We did not get off to a good start as the first part of the route headed off into an area that was closed due to logging. So we headed down the road into Corris and battled up an extraordinarily steep bridleway that left us both wondering if it was all worth it. After another push up a bridleway we made it to a junction of forest trails and it was downhill all the way after that. A mixture of forest trail, farmer’s track and steep twisting singletrack. Excellent fun.
Our route for Saturday can be seen here.
On our way out from the campsite we had spotted a pub just round the corner from the campsite – the Buckley Arms. We decided to give it a go for dinner and had a great time. The staff were all friendly and welcoming, the food was simple but excellent and they had decent beer. I can totally recommend the Buckley Arms.
Sunday
With Aran Fawddwy just up the road I had planned a fairly long mountain day. I had planned to park on the road, near the open access land in Cwm Cywarch. However, once there the opportunities were not as good as I had hoped. Luckily I spotted a sign post indicating that there was parking further up the valley. Amazingly, the farmer had developed a parking on a small piece of his land. Complete with all weather surface and a portaloo he had decided that this was better than tourists blocking his road, ruining his land and generally causing lots of problems by parking all over the road. By adding a collection box the farmer had managed to collect £1,300 over the last year, which was donated to the Welsh Air Ambulance.
Parking there a more obvious and slightly shorter route presented itself to us. We climbed up the stream, leaving the stunning views behind us and headed into the mist. It was soon raining hard with strong winds blowing from the side. Adding in the occasional snow drift and the going became quite hard work.
Our walking route can be seen on Trailzilla.
I’m sure that the views from here are truly stunning in clear weather, in the limited visibility we had in the clouds it looked fairly hairy, particulary on the crossing from Drws Bach to Drysgol.
We had planned to ascend Waun Goch and come down the steep sided valley of Cwm Terwyn. Unfortunately, D twisted her ankle coming down from Drysgol so we cut short our plans and headed down the gentle path, with stunning views back across the valley. The ridge we had walked across was hidden in the thick cloud.
When we got back to the camp site we got changed and headed out for dinner, back to the Buckley Arms Hotel again. It started raining just as we started dinner and continued to rain all evening. It carried on raining all night and by morning it was still raining and blowing a hoolie. Rather than head out to the hills we headed home in the rain, beating the bank holiday traffic.
Result, one day excellent mountain biking and one epic quality mountain day to add toward the ML assessment.
20110812 A wet and windy Cnicht
North Wales is wet. Even in the summer, such as it is this year, North Wales is wet. Wet conditions require kit and strategies to cope with the wetness, and the conditions that give rise to and are associated with the wetness.
What am I wittering on about, you may ask?
Well, with Denise heading off to the Fairport Convention festival at Cropredy this weekend, I had planned to head up to North Wales. Taking Friday off as holiday gave me some extra time to play with. So, I had planned to get up to Snowdonia early on Friday and head up into the hills Friday afternoon, giving me two nights of wild camping before heading back home on Sunday.
The forecast was mixed, low cloud and some showers of rain on Friday, with some rain showers overnight. Saturday would see the cloud lifting and the rain easing to leave a pleasant Saturday afternoon and Sunday.
As planned I made it up to Snowdonia for about 4.00pm on Friday, parked the van and set off. I had planned to try out my North Face trousers as walking trousers. However, in my enthusiasm to get going I left my lightweight Rohan Backpackers on and left the North Face trousers in the van. It was raining quite hard as I got ready in the back of the van, so as well as putting on my gaiters I put my waterproof trousers on as well as my waterproof jacket.
I skirted Llyn Gwynant before making it to the road, which I followed for about 500m, before heading up the footpath. By this stage it had stopped raining, so I took off the waterproof trousers before heading further up the path. And this is where it started to go wrong really. Heading towards the top of the path, the map clearly shows the footpath heading diagonally across the field to the left of the building. So why did I follow the track into the field and then head up through the tall rushes and grasses? By the time I realised that my trousers were wetting through it was too late. I was halfway across and had no option to keep going. By the time I made it to the ruins my trousers were completely soaked. They are quite thin and dry relatively quickly in a steady breeze, so I kept going hoping they would dry out.
I made it through the woods without any real incident and emerged onto the board walks on the far side. My trousers were still very wet when it started to rain steadily. I didn’t have any real choice but to put my waterproof trousers on over the top of my damp trousers. It continued to rain as I left the board walks behind and walked across the field to emerge on the corner of the narrow road. I followed the road for about 500m until I reached the house where paths left the road to the west and the east. I followed the path to the east, down the hill, across the stream and up past the house at Llwynyrhwch. Up to this point the path had been easy to follow and the entrance to open access land was obviously marked. The path up and over the rock was easy to follow but then it all went a bit pear shaped. All the water coming off the hill filled the many stream beds and made all the flat ground marshy.
Looking at the map now it is obvious that the path follows the stream up the hill. However, on Friday evening, as the rain was falling and the cloud was pouring across the sky things were not so obvious. I knew I needed to follow the main stream up the hill and so battled my way through waist high ferns. The higher I got the thicker the cloud became and the lower the visibility.
I was having to micro nav my way through the mist and across the marshy fields until I found the main stream and followed it up to Llyn Llagi.Crossing the outlet from the Llyn was quite an effort as there was a huge amount of water pouring out. I followed the edge of the Llyn to pick up the wall on the southern edge, passing what looked like a rainfall collection station.
I used the wall as a handrail, looking for the footpath near Bwlch y Battel. I finally found a stile crossing the wall and decided that I must be at my destination, even though I could not see the path passing between two steep sided slopes. Even though I had planned to go further on the first day I decided to stop and camp for the night.
I managed to find a fairly flat spot that wasn’t likely to flood during the night. Although it was quite exposed I actually wanted the wind blowing through the tent, in an attempt to reduce condensation. I managed to get a reasonably good nights sleep, although I was woken by the wind a few times. I’m glad I packed my bivvi bag as I am sure that it helped keep my down bag dry, given all the moisture that was around, although in the morning the foot of the bag was mysteriously quite damp.
I had thought, and hoped, that the cloud would life in the morning but I got up to find that the cloud was as low as it had been the night before. I had a light breakfast and packed my tent away before taking heading off on a bearing that should take me along the desired path. It was only after I had been following this bearing for about 150m that I realised that where I had camped the night before had not been where I thought I was.
Lessons learned:
- Just because there is a stile does not mean there is a footpath.
- Take everything into account before deciding on location – dont make the map fit the ground or vice versa
Cnicht
I had planned an ascent via the North Western ridge. In good old ML training style I was looking for the ring contours. However, as I decided that I was where the ascent should start it was chucking it down with rain, blowing a hoolie and the cloud was so low that at time visibility was down to 50m. It seemed that the sensible thing to do would be to contour around and aim to pick up the main footpath up the Southern ridge. I worked my way around the hillside, stopping often to try and compare what I could see on the map with what I could see on the ground. Eventually I spotted a path running alongside a stream. After what had seemed ages going across country it was a joy to see a path that promised an easier rate of progress. However, the joy was tinged by the realisation that I was about 250 south west where I thought I was.
I followed the path down hill, looking for a way to head to my left and attain the main ridge. However, the farmer had been extra vigilant and all the walls were well made, topped with another 6′ of wire and topped with barbed wire. I had no choice but to follow the path I was on to the junction with the main ridge path, which was well signposted to Cnicht. The path is easy to follow with a grass slope, and a few rocky sections, that leads to a wall. Over the wall is an opposing face but once over the wall the obvious path leads to the left and around the obstacle to regain the ridge. More grass slopes and a bit of scramble leads to a level area, with a pinnacle on the left and low cairn in the middle.
Was this the summit?
Er, no!
Just beyond the cairn, a slightly darker grey than the surrounding mist, was the outline of the final leg, a dark grey equilateral triangle of a face. As I got closer it loomed larger, a seemingly insurmountable obstacle. I made a number of logical promises to myself; “I won’t climb up anything I can’t climb down”, “If I can’t get up here I will retreat and walk up the valley”.
As I got closer to the foot of the wall a path became apparent, and rather than leading straight up the wall it led around to the right and then back to the left in an easy to follow, steady ascent that probably wouldn’t event rank as Grade 1, and I soon emerged on to the cloud covered windswept summit ridge.
The Descent
Coming down seemed easy, just follow the county boundary until I hit the footpath. And indeed the path was easy to follow, even in the mist. However, again, without any visible clues beyond the 100m or so I could see it was impossible to tell if I was where I thought I was. At the first junction with what I thought was a track I decided to push on for a bit to be sure. And then, when I encountered what looked like another junction I thought that the only way to confirm it was to walk 150m on a bearing that should take be to the edge of the Llyn. Which it did, luckily, but straight across more bog.
The plan had been to continue east and then north to Ysgafell Wen, and I had hoped that by now (getting on for mid day Saturday) the cloud would have lifted somewhat. However, the cloud seemed to be as thick as ever, I couldn’t see more than 100m at most, my feet were wet, my legs were wet and the map showed a footpath back to Llwynyrhwch, from where I had ascended the day before.
So I bailed out and headed back. I tracked round the edge of the Llyn before taking a bearing to ensure I followed the path and not the outpouring from the Llyn. The path down was the path that I should have taken up the hill the day before. Going down it was much clearer than it had been on the way up but there were still places that I had to guess at.
I made it back to the van, got changed into some dry clothes and headed home.
My planned route is here, while my actual route is here.
The few photos I took can be found here.
Footnote
A while ago I read an article about people not using open access land. There is a reason why most people stick to the paths. Its because going cross country is hard work, especially when its boggy and there is poor visibility.
More experience and more practice needed but it should make one if not two more QMDs.
My First Leadership experience: the Snowdon Horseshoe
Having completed my Mountain Leader training back in April of this year I now have to rack up a number of Quality Mountain Days (QMDs) before I can think about going back to do my assessment. As well as working on improving a number of skills I also need to get some experience of actually leading groups of people (which may prove tricky since I am not a Mountain Leader yet, thats the whole point, but we shall see. And I digress).
A friend of mine, Caroline, recently attempted Crib Goch with the assistance of a guide that she had hired for the day. However, the weather was against them and they had to turn back. So, I posted on Caroline’s Facebook wall that if she wanted to try again then she should let me know. I have to admit that I wasn’t expecting a response a short while later suggesting the following weekend and asking if we could attempt the full Snowdon Horseshoe!
However, keen to not turn down any opportunity of another QMD and an opportunity to practice some of the stuff we covered on the ML course I accepted Caroline’s request. There followed a frantic week (mainly on Caroline’s part) to find accomodation and come up with a strategy. As the week progressed the weather forecast looked like Saturday might just offer a window of opportunity so we agreed to camp at the Swallow Falls hotel and drive up to Pen Y Pass bright and early Saturday morning.
We both made it up to Betws – y – Coed in pretty good time on Friday evening and after a swift drink in the bar retired to our respective tents. I woke the next morning just before my alarm went off at 5:30am. We got up, had a quick breakfast and cup of coffee before heading up to Pen Y Pass. By the time we had parked up, got a ticket and sorted out our kit it was probably around 7am by the time we set off, heading up the Pyg track on the start of our big adventure.
The morning had started with clear blue skies and bright sunshine. However, as we progressed along the Pyg track, so the cloud started to build so that by the time we left the Pyg at Bwlch y Moch the clouds were obscuring the summit of Snowdon and the top of Crib Goch. As we were about to start the first scramble it started to rain and by the time we were half way up the initial ascent it was hailing! Hailing, in June!!
By the time we reached the ridge the rain and hail had ceased but the ridge was still wreathed in cloud.
We managed to make our way along the ridge, only descending slightly to work our way around a gulley that almost cut the ridge in two. There must be a way over the top as the group behind us managed to overtake us somehow on this section.
We had made it along the Crib Goch ridge to Bwlch Goch, only to be faced with wall of Garnedd Ugain. The phrase that sprung to mind was “How on earth are we going to get up there?”
But, get up it we did. After an initial false start trying to find a route myself, we ended up following another group who had had more success at route finding than we had. Once at the top of the wall we found ourselves on another narrow ridge, which almost imperceptibly got easier and wider until the trig point at the summit appeared through the mist and we had made it to the summit of Garnedd Ugain.
Descending from the trig point it was almost as if we were strolling across open parkland – although there were rocks on the ground and we were still on the summit ridge I knew that the drop off to my right was about 100m away (because I had navigated to it on the ML course). A whole 100m!! That was huge when for the last two hours we had been working our way along a knife edge.
Before we knew where we were the Snowdon railway was on our right and the marker stone at the top of the Pyg track was on our left. We were on the final approach to the summit of Snowdon. By this time there were a few more people about and we were passed by the little steam engine working hard to push a single carriage of tourists towards the top of the mountain. It was very odd to look in at these people sipping their coffees as we slogged up the slope, the wind gusting around us. It was even odder when we finally made it to the summit to see some of these tourists in their designer label open toed sandals and casual outfits strolling around the summit.
Sixth time on the summit, sixth time with no view.
Although this was my sixth time at the summit, it was the first time I had been there when the visitor center was open. So, we popped in for a coffee. Such a bizarre experience, knowing that you are on the top of the highest mountain in England and Wales, and yet it was just like being in a fast food outlet in a town somewhere. I hope the people who work there get the train to work.
After the coffee we headed back out into the mist and started our descent, heading towards the South Ridge until we came across the marker stone at the head of the Watkin path, where we turned and headed down the scree slope.
This was a new experience for me on two accounts. It was the first time that I had descended via the Watkin path and it was the first time that I had seen the Watkin path in its entirity, without it being covered in mist. (Note to self – in future keep to the left on the ascent and aim for the marker stone rather than trying to ascend via the scree slopes).
Thanks to the clearing weather we were able to make it down the scree slopes relatively quickly and easily and made it safely to Bwlch y Saethau, from where we could see the route we had taken so far, the slope of Lliwedd looming in front of us and tremendous views of Glaslyn, Lln Llydaw and the Cribau ridge (which I had ascended on the ML course).
And now we were into the final leg. An easy scramble got us to the top of the West Peak of Lliwedd via some spots for a brief rest and a look back over the route we had travelled.
Once on the West peak there was a short down before another quick up to the summit of the East Peak. From there is was literally down hill all the way via Lliwedd Bach and the path down to the Miner’s track and then back to Pen Y Pass car park and another well earned cup of coffee in the cafe.
Total time, about 8 hours. During that time I managed to point out some interesting features and talk to Caroline about lichens, hexagonal columnar cooling, and various other topics.
A full set of my photos are available on my Flickr site here. And a map of the route is here.
Plas y Brenin Nature Trail and Moel Siabod
At the end of last year we were due to attend the Big Christmas Walk, the weekend before Christmas. Unfortunately a small amount of slush brought Oxfordshire’s roads to a standstill and it took us two hours to get from Oxford to Warwick. When we heard that the A5 in Llanberis was shut due to snow we rang Plas y Brenin to learn that it was still snowing and the snow plough had already been past twice. They advised us that our money could be saved and put toward another course, so we took this option rather than risking the journey. We later found out that out of 120 planned attendees only 60 made it and the staff spent all weekend trying to dig cars out of the car park.
So, the money was put towards another course and we chose the Nature Trail weekend. We are both interested in the environment and I thought that the extra information would be a useful addition to the stuff I’m learning for the ML. We both had Friday off work so headed up to Wales, setting off just before lunch. At Banbury I realised that I only had one test strip for the whole weekend, so instead of spending Friday afternoon relaxing at the Brenin, we spent it dashing from the GP surgery in Betws to the Asda pharmacy in Llandudno, before finally reaching the Brenin around 7pm.
We had dinner and a couple of pints of Boot Liquor in the bar before heading off to bed.
Saturday
Saturday morning we met in the conference room for the normal briefing from the duty instructor before being introduced to our instructor (Louise Beetlestone) and the other three delegates on the course. Along the way I happened to bump into Stu and Steve, two of the instructors from the ML course.
Of the other delegates Steve wanted to brush up on his geology knowledge for his IML assessment and his wife Hazel was along for the weekend holiday. Debs was there to see more plants while her other half was doing his 2 star kayaking with Spike.
After the introductions we grabbed our packs and boots and headed out in a minibus to the minor roads north of Dinorwic and the edge of the National Park. Louise parked the minibus and we headed up the track towards Carnedd y Filliast. The route took us along the ridge to Mynydd Perfedd and then across a narrow ridge, Bwlch y Marchlyn to Elidir Fawr. From there we descended the scree slope towards Elidir Fach and then back to the road and thus back to the van.
Along the way Louise talked about the geology of the area, the different ages of rock and showed us the anticline at Marchlyn Bach. We also identified numerous plants and several birds including the Wheatear (previously named the White Arse before it was changed by the Victorians), the Skylark, the Raven and Meadow Pipit.
On the way back to the Brenin we stopped off at the bus stop car park to visit the viewing point for the Llanberis slate quarries. They are huge! And amazing to see how structures have been built on the piles of waste slate.
Saturday Evening
We made it back to the Brenin in time for tea and cakes and then spent some time in one of the class rooms talking more about geology and attempting to identify some of the plants and lichens we had encountered. My photos from both days are shown on my Flickr site. I have tried to identify all the plants but would welcome any comments on the ones I haven’t identified or if you think I have made a mistake with any of them.
After dinner we attended a talk by Ollie about some of the expeditions to Chile and Greenland he has undertaken in recent years. The photos were very good and most of the talk was very interesting but it didn’t flow very well and Ollie was prone to mumble quite a bit as he talked to the screen rather than the audience, so some parts were difficult to follow.
Sunday
Sunday morning we met at 9.15 under the canopy before heading out, in a car this time, to Ogwen Cottage. From the car park we headed up towards Cwm Idwal, skirting to the east of Llyn Idwal and passing under the (in)famous Idwal slabs. We climbed towards Twll Du (Devils Kitchen) and, crossing the stream we headed up a narrow “Sheep track” to the right hand side. It was indeed narrow in some places, with quite a lot of exposure. I don’t think I would have had the confidence to go that way by myself, although now I know it is possible to get out on to the ridge I might try it again in future.
The path led us underneath the “Curtain” and the water falling from it gave us our own localised rain storm. Apparently this freezes in the winter and makes for a major ice climb. After a bit of a scramble the gulley opened out and we made it on to the top.
Crossing the stream that feeds into Twll Du we examined the rock for pillow lava and ripples before heading down the path on the other side of Twll Du and following the footpath through the moraine around the western edge of Llyn Idwal. There was a brief detour to look down the Nant Ffrancon valley. Louise pointed out a roche montanne and we all took ages to spot it, picking our own features in the valley before being directed to the correct one. (A discussion of the gacial features of Cwm Idwal and Nant Ffrancon can be found here).
Then it was time to head back to the car via a whetstone quarry, before heading back to the Brenin. We had a debrief over much needed tea and cakes before heading our separate ways.
Sunday Night
Rather than heading home we went a few miles down the road to Dol Gam campsite. It being a bank holiday weekend we were planning to spend Monday in Snowdonia as well. I had tried to get us a room at the Brenin Sunday night but they were full. So we went down to the campsite and tried out our new tent – a Terra Nova Superlite Quasar.
We had dinner, pizza and beer, in the cafe just up the road from the camp site. A great little place with copies of Climber magazine from the 1960s and 70s. Interesting to see that although kit technology has moved on the issues, particularly surrounding litter in the mountains, have not.
We spent a very comfortable night in the tent, with lots of room for both of us and woke refreshed on Monday morning, although as soon as we stepped out of the tent the midges attacked us in swarms and encouraged us to leave the campsite asap.
Moel Siabod
We drove back the Brenin to check the weather forecast and since it advised that the rain of the morning would clear by the afternoon we decided to have a go at Moel Siabod. We drove back towards the campsite and left the car in a hotel car park – £3 a day isn’t bad for someone to keep an eye on it for you.
We headed down the road and turned right down a minor side road and right again up a track. A well signed path led us around a farm and on to moorland. Crossing into open access land we passed a reservoir and headed up into some old mine workings. We passed an old quarry that is now filled with water. Nothing particularly strange about that as there are several of these across the Snowdonia National Park, but this one looked really deep. We could see the rock faces just dropping away under the water with no sign of the bottom.
Walking on above the quarry we followed the path as it contoured around the lower slopes of Moel Siabod, above the streams that flow into Llyn y Foel. Daear Ddu, the south-eastern ridge sticks out from the summit with a sheer face and gulley running up the side. As we climbed away from the Llyn we had a choice of heading to the ridge or following the gulley. We chose the gulley and slowly worked our way up the scree covered slope, which seemed to get steeper and steeper as we neared the summit. Finally an easy scramble up some wet rocks bought us out onto the summit, just a few meters east of the trig point.
After admiring the view we headed down the North Eastern slope, aiming for Plas y Brenin and soon picked up the path that led us into the wood and back to the car.
ML (Summer) Training Day One – Micro Nav
Arrival
With the course starting on Saturday morning I had taken the Friday off work to give me time to pack and drive up there in reasonable time. Even with a load of faffing I was still packed by about 11.30am and so set off to North Wales at a steady pace. Typically, it was only as I was driving through Llangollen that I realised that I had not packed the summer walking shirts that I had been planning to take with me. Nor had I packed any sun cream or insect repellant. A quick stop at Cotswold Outdoor in Betwys – y – Coed remedied all three of those omissions and I was quickly on my way again, arriving at the Brenin around 4.30pm.
The room would not be ready until around 8pm so I had a couple of hours to kill. Taking advantage of the glorious weather I wandered across the bridge out the back of the Brenin and up the path leading towards Moel Siabod.
I got back to the car about 5.30pm. So, still having a couple of hours to kill I went to the bar, where I sampled a pint of each of the three bitters and enjoyed a great bar meal of pie and chips.
Suitably fed and watered I headed to reception to sign in and collect my key. The Brenin have finally taken a step into the 21st century and now have plastic key cards rather than the heavy key fob we had had on the winter walking course. As I was expecting, the room was clean and tidy with two single beds and a large bathroom. Being the first in the room I bagged the bed furthest from the door and nearest the window and unpacked some of my kit.
It was quite late in the evening and I had gone to bed when my room mate arrived. Jim had arrived by train at Llandudno Junction and been picked up, along with several others, by one of the Pyb mini buses. We introduced ourselves and had a quick chat before turning in for the night.
Introductions
Saturday morning saw the first of many great meals at the Brenin. I was very good and refrained from having a cooked breakfast each day – sticking instead to cereal.
After breakfast there was an introductory welcome talk from the duty manager who then sent us to the relevant rooms under the guidance of our instructor for the week – SM. We 11 delegates sat ourselves around the table with SM at the head. There then followed the normal training course staple of “Who are you and why are you here?”. To which the answers were “to help run DofE” or “to develop personal skills”, mainly.
SM then split the elevel of us into two groups. One group of six guys would be looked after by another instructor – Steve, while SM would take the remaining guy and the four girls.
We had a chat about the weather, a chance to collect some kit and then we headed out in our respective groups for some micro nav.
Micro Nav
The day started with some pacing. We all walked along and counted the paces required to cover 100m. I came out at 63, which was only slightly different from the 66 I did in the snow last year.
We then practiced map memory by looking at the map and deciding what features we might see as we walked a specific route and then ticking off those features as we actually walked the route.
These exercises led us through the woods at the back of the Brenin to the youth hostel in Capel Curig. From there we headed up towards Clogwyn Mawr and Nant y Geuallt, where we looked at contours and re-entrants before practicing walking bearings for short distances by placing objects in the area and getting someone else to retrieve them, given only the bearing and the distance.
Following this game our instructor, Steve, set us objectives. In pairs we were to navigate the rest of the group to the given objectives. From the starting point it was up to small spur, then on to a stream source and then pairs were given their own objectives before heading back to the Australia contour.
Click here for the map.
Here there was short break to discuss lichens (crustacose, foliose and fruticose), heathers (ling, bell and ?), before heading off to one final objective (Hill 337) and an (almost) final debrief from Steve. On the path back to the Brenin we passed through some old woodland at the base of Clogwyn Mawr and spotted some wood sorrell. Although this is edible we refrained from trying any of this as it was right on the path used by dog walkers. (A week later I was in Wytham Woods near Oxford – from where dogs are banned – and I found some more wood sorrell, which I did taste).
Carl Sprake 