A Day’s Glyding – Extreme Father’s Day!

Mum and Dad came up to see us for a few days so I took the week off work.  Dad decided he wanted to check out the views from the Glyders again – he did them a few years back but I’ve never tried them and the weather was looking perfect for a lad’s day out!  As it was definitely a Black Label route only Sami was coming with us – Paula and Mum would walk into Betws with Megan and meet us for pint and animated discussion of our daring do later.  It’s probably going to be the last walk I don’t take Megan on because I’ve done a couple of interesting routes since this one and she’s been better behaved than Sami…

In preparation for the week I persuaded Paula I couldn’t do without a decent camera so, after a trip to Jessops, I set off with a Canon 450D and a couple of lenses. Believe me, the photos in this blog are only a fraction of the ones I took on the walk and I couldn’t be more pleased with my new toy, although the operator could do with some more practice!

We parked at the bottom of the Miner’s Track near the Pen Y Gwryd Hotel – our rationale being that, although parking at Pen Y Pass would make the start of the walk easier, it would be really hard finishing it by trekking up the road, and for the extremely impoverished it was free to leave the car there!

 

The trek up the road is well known to anyone who doesn’t get to the Pen Y Pass car park at a reasonable time or isn’t astonishingly lucky (see Highs and Lows – Part 2 – Saturday).  Face the on-coming traffic and be ready to jump over the barrier when people come round the corners too fast – although generally there aren’t too many problems!  Once you get to the car park, instead of turning left to do the Miner’s and Pyg paths up Snowdon, carry on past the car park and buildings and turn right at the footpath sign on the other side of the road.  You cut around behind the buildings and the climbing starts immediately.  Within a couple of hundred metres we came across a huge water tank and a bunch of tents, although it seemed a strange place to have them (tents not tank) – admittedly sheltered from the wind but one of the few places in Snowdonia with absolutely no view!  And the weather had been nice for days…

 

With the first climb finished the ground levelled out for a while so we could get our breath back and start to admire the views.

 

 

 

That’s Llyn Cwmffynnon and of course Moel Siabod…

As the climb starts again you can follow the extremely helpful red blobs – patches of paint put down to show you the easiest route up the hill.  As always I had plotted our route into the GPS according to the path on the OS map; it didn’t follow the blob route exactly but we did. 

Our route up to the Glyders keeps Snowdon’s peak (in the background below) quite well hidden most of the time – behind Garnedd Ugain (in the forground), home of the rather terrifying Crib Goch route and not one I’m likely to be taking the dogs up…

 

 

 

Our much more pleasant path was still climbing relatively steeply and Pen Y Pass soon disappeared behind us.

 

And the twin peaks we were aiming for loomed up ahead of us.

 

 

 

A bit more climbing, a few more red blobs, and we were pretty much at the top where it flattens out completely and we started seeing other walkers, although we had been overtaken up our route by one guy, going like a rocket and looking like he could keep up that pace all day!

 

The views from the top were as you might expect, spectacular.  This one overlooks Llyn Idwal, down the valley following the A5 towards Bangor, the Menai Strait and Anglesey. 

 

 

 

 

A bit more wandering around and a couple of hundred photos later and we had done Glyder Fawr and it was time to take on the next peak, which is actually dead easy to do once you’re up here and very little climbing required!

 

 

 

But you do get a different perspective on the surrounding peaks and valleys, like this one looking down over the valley the Afon Glaslyn runs through, going around the base of Snowdon following the A498.

 

 

 

Another route up to the Glyders is over Tryfan, via Heather Terrace, which sounds like a pleasant stroll but is over the only peak in Snowdonia that supposedly cannot be reached without using your hands and knees. Another one I’m not taking the dogs up!

 

 

 

After all that it was definitely time for a rest and some lunch – this time round I even remembered food for the dog! I’d also recommend taking water for dogs as there are not a lot of natural water sources up here.  After some fiddling with the camera I managed to get the timer function to work!

 

 

 

I even let dad take some photos – this is the famous cantilever with me and Sami – although unfortunately you can’t see the sliver of moon in the background of this shot which set off the beautiful blue sky superbly!  We had been extremely lucky on the way up, quite a few clouds around to help us cool down occasionally but by the time we reached the top they had all dispersed and everything was completely clear.

 

 

 

I’ve even forced Paula to have that shot as the wallpaper on her PC!  The peaks of the Glyders are completely different to their surroundings – shards of rock jutting into the sky like a huge stony hedgehog.

 

 

 

With Glyder Fach conquered that just left the walk back down with the stunning view of the Glaslyn valley to occupy us.

 

 

 

 

By this time we had spent longer than anticipated messing about at the top and were getting late for our meeting with the girls.  Using all my pre-planning capabilities I had remembered to bring out my phone but didn’t actually have any credit on it and didn’t have my debit cards…  I had to wait for Paula to call me, once we were overdue the habitual “reached summit” phone call, to explain the situation.  Again we were lucky with the weather being recently dry and sunny because it meant we could take a short cut to the Miner’s track over what would normally have been knee-deep boggy ground.  Once we hit the track, the car and hotel were soon in sight but still a long way off.

 

Although we were following the Miner’s track down it’s still not a path you can take too quickly – it’s far from smooth and meanders around all the way down, cutting through numerous rivers – but it’s easier than making up your own path!  As the ground started to level out towards the bottom Sami spotted the car and went into sulk mode – even though we had been out for hours!

 

 

 

Her sulk mode involves sitting and then lying down and refusing to budge until I put the lead on her.  Once the lead is on she’s happy and will trot along willingly, although being lifted by her handle over the bridge at the bottom of the path never goes down too well…

The whole walk was about 6.5 miles (10.5km) long and we climbed nearly 850 metres in height.  We took our time, walking for about 5 hours and reached two peaks, Glyder Fawr at 999 metres and Gyder Fach at 994 metres.  Unusually for one of my treks neither of the routes, up or down, were better or worse than the other, both a challenge but no need for hands and knees scrabbling on either.  I would highly recommend them to anyone who fancies doing something a bit different to Snowdon and as my 70 year young dad managed them so can you – as long as you have kept yourself very fit for the past 40 years…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Highs and Lows – Part 2 – Saturday

The weather was nice again… not for sunbathing as it was slightly overcast but the cloud was high so it was a perfect day for some serious walking – and photo taking, you’ve been warned!  I got Sami harnessed up, packed some lunch into my new rucksack (Berghaus Freeflow – not huge – 23 litres but enough for my purposes and the air flow idea is genius!) and set off for Snowdon.  Got to the Pen Y Pass car park for just after 9:30 to find the Carpark Full and No Waiting signs already put out – I was also put-out.  Still determined to do the mountain so I drove back down the hill to the Pen Y Gwryd Hotel and parked on the verge opposite.  It added about an extra 2 miles to the trek and over 100 metres of extra climb but using the surge of adrenalin fuelled frustration I was in the car park in 15 minutes and ready to start the walk proper.

 

I was going to do the Miners\Pyg I had planned a couple of weeks ago because it’s one of the quickest walks to the peak – none of them are easy, even the Llanberis path because that is so flipping long!  Neither are any of the walks really part of secret Snowdonia as there are hundreds of people trekking all of them – hence the full car parks!  The Miner’s path starts off very easy – a nice wide path, relatively flat but still with some stunning views.  For the first 3 miles you don’t ascend more than 300 metres!

 

After you’ve done the first long rounding bend you come to the first lake – Llyn Teyrn.  It’s quite a long way below the path but that doesn’t stop Sami wanting to know if she can go for a swim…

 

 

As you can just make out from the photo above the path carries on flatly around Teyrn and then cuts back to the right to bring you to the largest lake on the walk – Llyn Llydaw – a massive reservoir that the huge pipe comes flowing out from.  It’s split by a manmade causeway and even the overflow section is twice the size of Llyn Teyrn – but this time near enough for Sami to have a swim! 

 

The path again follows around the edge of the lake and you finally get to see why this is called the Miner’s Track, with large derelict mining buildings jutting out from the mountainside.

 

 

Strangely enough this was where we saw the only wildlife other than various birds (mainly seagulls), Snowdon’s wild goats – they must be hard as nails being able to survive winters up here!

 

 

 

After that there’s almost a bit of climbing to do!  But now you really start to see the task ahead of you…

 

The path gets steeper again – in the space of half a mile you have just climbed 200 metres of the 300 you will do on the easy stretch of the Miner’s path!  But the path does take you past the waterfalls, which are loud and far more impressive than this photo suggests!

 

 

That small climb brings you to the final lake – Glaslyn.  Fed by the Pant y Lluwchfa, stretching almost from the peak and feeding the Afon Glaslyn down into Llyn Llydaw: a staging area for two massive sets of waterfalls and an ideal spot for a break before the real hard slog starts.

 

 

This next photo attempts to show the route and meeting up of the two paths – but I do not guarantee the accuracy of the Miner’s in any way!  You can see how much more gradual the Pyg is up until they meet – the Miner’s (and the Pyg) are steep from now until the top ridge.

 

 

From this point at the bottom of the slope to the top is just under 3000 feet of climb – all of it leg and lung busting.  The path is well defined so you don’t really need a map or the GPS plus you are following loads of people so it’s hard to get lost.  There’s a lot of work going on to maintain the path as well. I wouldn’t fancy having to shift those rocks around by hand, there’s no way you could get anything mechanical up here, even though the bags were dropped off by helicopter – I just hope they close it when they do!

 

 

I was taking a lot of quick breaks by now – a couple of minutes walk followed by a few seconds resting, Sami likes the walking but gets bored very quickly by the resting… it also means we were constantly leapfrogging the same people as we all made our way to the top.

 

 

The other people rarely remember me but they all remember the dog!  Especially the kids and other dogs, of which there were a surprisingly large amount.  By now everyone is finding it hard going but when you see the peak getting closer it does make it seem a bit easier… and that is snow on the mountain!

 

 

Now is usually a good time to get your jacket on – I’ve been in my walking shirt up until now.  The next milestone is the ridge that leads up to the summit – once you’re on it the other side of the mountain appears, along with the howling gale you get however good the weather has been – hence the jacket.

 

 

The views are well worthwhile though!  Llanberis is just visible in the distance.

 

 

Moel Cynghorion

 

 

Foel Goch and Foel Gron

 

 

Just a short, relatively flat, walk to the top now – it took me just over 2 hours to make it (1085 metres or 3496 feet at the peak, 3207 feet from the Pen Y Pass car park) which isn’t bad as I had the extra road work to do!  The way up is surrounded by groups having lunch – the peak gets too busy to settle down comfortably but I’ve gone this far I’m at least going to take some photos from up there!  Even the Pyg looks a bit distant now!

 

 

And Moel Siabod. (Our local mountain and well known to any one who has read the rest of this blog!  If you don’t know it just keep scrolling down!)

 

 

The Summit Café is undergoing a complete rebuild and they’ve done a lot of work since the last time I was up here – they were laying the foundations then.  And while the building work is being done the train isn’t in use so at least you know everyone up here has done it the hard way!

 

 

We found a nice quiet spot for lunch – Sami’s getting used to sharing my lunch now but I have got to remember to take dog biscuits with me in future!  I also phoned Paula to let her know we’d reached the top – our plan was to meet up for a drink in the Royal Oak in Betws – I figured it would take me about an hour and a half to get back down and it would take her that long to walk into the village with Megan.

 

 

After 10 minutes for lunch we’re off again.  In my opinion the worst part of the whole walk is stepping off the ridge to go back down the Pyg path – I thought it was last time I did this route, in the snow in 2006.  It looks like a sheer drop with nothing to stop your fall – on the way up isn’t so bad because you’re out of breath and just itching to get to the ridge.  On the way down it feels like a step into an abyss… but there do seem to be a lot more people on the way up now.

 

 

Where the Miner’s and Pyg join there is a large stone slab sticking out of the ground to mark it – just next to the bloke at the front in the picture below – not particularly interesting but it is there and there’s another one on the ridge where the paths come out.

 

 

Our walk back along the Pyg overlooks much of the Miner’s so you get a completely different perspective on the whole thing as well as enough wind to get Sami’s ears flapping.

 

But the views back up the mountain are no less spectacular!

 

 

Once you’ve passed the split where the Miner’s track goes off, the walk becomes much smoother with very little scrambling required.

 

 

I now understand why the organisers of our 2006 trip picked this route, at the time in knee-deep snow, with no grip from my boots and only one stick to grab hold of I thought it was slightly terrifying but if we’d done any other path (except the Llanberis trek which is only for young children or people afraid of heights) it would have been truly cheek clenching!

About half way back along the “just Pyg” path you get a nice view of the causeway going through Llyn Llydaw and about here you can split off the Pyg and head down a different route that brings you back out on the Miner’s track but you’d miss out on the Llanberis Pass valley which is worth a look in anybody’s book.

 

Then the other way, a bit further down…

 

And although we still had a mile to carry on after the Pen Y Pass car park the views from the road were still spectacular – even if you do look like a tourist taking photos from the road!

 

 

It took just under two hours to get back to the car so in total we’d been out for about 4 hours – Paula was waiting in the pub for a bit but not too long.  The route I’d plugged into the GPS was 7.6 miles long and the map software estimated it would take me 4 hours – so I was happy enough with 2 miles added to that and to still get it done in 4!  I highly recommend it if you’re feeling energetic and it is one of the quickest routes up and down the mountain, especially if you get to the car park early enough…