A challenging and at times exhilarating way to avoid climbing Snowdon

Date walked:  June 24th 2022

Distance: About 7 miles

Maps used:  OS Explorer OL 17 Snowdon (or Yr Wyddfa as a new campaign would have us exclusively name it)

Guide used: Walking the Cambrian Way by George Todd and Richard Tyler (Cicerone Press)

********

It seems to be taking a very long time to complete this project; and after today’s walk I’m not sure that it will ever be finished but I’ll come to that later. I did the last walk over Cnicht in April last year, so my starting point should have been the same car park by the hamlet of Croesor. And that was today’s plan, meeting Paul at the end of the walk and then driving one of the cars back to Croesor. We met just before 12, the forecast for today was cloudy with some showers but tomorrow threatened rain. So free spirits that we are and not hidebound by plans or conventions we made a spontaneous decision to do the “big” walk first.

Thanks to Paul for this study of me

Unsurprisingly for a route intended to cross most of the highest peaks between Cardiff and Conwy, the “official ” section of the Cambrian Way today would have had us climb to the summit of Snowdon and then take the Pyg track back to Pen y Pass, and the Guide would have had us do this as an 11 mile hike from Beddgelert.

Well I didn’t fancy this for two reasons. The first and main reason (you’ll have to believe me) is that I feel increasingly alienated by the ridiculous obsession of the general public with “bagging” peaks of hills and mountains, whether it is Everest or Kilimanjaro, or closer to home, Snowdon or Ben Nevis (and several others). The result of this is that these wonderful places have become congested honeypots often with lines of people queuing to take their selfies. And no other peak  in the British Isles has been more ruined than the summit of Snowdon with its expensive toy train and its monstrous carbuncle of a café. So in protest I had decided to boycott the place. Secondly, I feel increasingly insecure about my physical ability to cope with the most challenging climbs and even if I can cope, to enjoy the process. Paul didn’t fancy it either so our plan was to take the Watkin Path to Bwlch Ciliau and then traverse south of Llyn Llydaw. Still not exactly a walk in the park.

The flight of stone steps was a welcome start, the path winding up through mostly oak woods which muffled the noise of the busy A498 below.

From the outset it was clear that we benefited from this being a very popular route, with wide paths, good surfaces and sturdy bridges designed to cope with a large footfall. Nevertheless it was hardly crowded.

It was also very well signed so at the start at least there were no anxieties about navigation.

We soon left the wood behind, taking the valley of the Cwm Llan stream, climbing on a wide gravel track.

This was a slate quarrying area and ahead the steep track that would have carried carts of stone down from the quarries was easy to make out amidst the thick bracken-covered slopes.

The tumbling stream has several waterfalls and deep pools, providing entertainment for those with little walking appetite.

The gravel path transitioned to one of well laid slabs as we left some of those intent on Snowdon’s summit (those seeking the alternative and more demanding scramble by Clogwyn Du) and climbed towards Gladstone Rock…..

… passing several buildings associated with the quarrying on the way.

Gladstone rock  was the site at which the then 82 year old Prime Minister, William Gladstone, (clearly pretty fit for his age) formally opened the Watkin Path and where he gave an impassioned speech about Justice for Wales and sang some songs. Paul offered a couple of verses of Land of My Fathers (in Welsh, natch).

To my mind it is a great shame that there aren’t discreet speakers  broadcasting the speech  to those making the pilgrimage today. The National Park has missed a trick here.

Still heading for the site of the quarries, we passed a haunting row of derelict cottages…

… before starting a much steeper climb on well-laid stone steps.

The half a mile up to Bwlch Ciliau from here was a slog;

Thnaks to Paul for this inspired shot

I might not look it but was grateful for the secure path – Paul found it somewhat monotonous.

We reached our turning point, shrouded in low cloud,  at around 1 o clock which I didn’t think was bad going.

We were a lot slower for the second half of the walk. On the map the route to the Snowdon summit was marked green; our route was shown in black dots, which meant that for much of the next mile or so we were scrambling over rocks with little sense of whether we were going the right way or not.

In these circumstances passing cairns of stone was hugely reassuring and broadly speaking the GPS tracking of the route on my phone helped.

Several times we turned to the left to be confronted by a misty void that promised a fatally steep drop should we have proceeded.

This is one of Paul’s as its better than any I took

Through the mist we heard a group of guys making their way behind us and for a while we shouted  encouragement back in their direction as we carefully picked our own way amongst the rocks…..

… stopping occasionally to take a pic.

There was little growing here but at one point I noticed a small colony of a prostrate shrub…

Juniper?

… and a few seemingly happy and pretty yellow flowers.

And hey, there were even a few sheep!

We, like sheep

It was hard going but at the same time it did feel like an adventure but I was glad when the path began to reappear and we got a first glimpse of the Llyn Llydaw reservoir.

We met up with the three guys around here who had just been disembodied voices up to now – three friends celebrating one of their 50th birthdays (kids really). As is often the case, the descent towards the lake was harder than the climb up and we had to pause several times to find a plausible route.

Caption for what the sheep was thinking?

We managed it without too many slips and soon we were marching down to the lakeside.

See I don’t really have a bald spot

A green painted corrugated iron hut housed the head of the workings of a small hydro scheme…

….and whilst we thought the colour of the hut was remarkably in sympathy with its surroundings, the same couldn’t be said of the stark white eyesore of the pipes that carried the water down the valley.

The mile march from the reservoir to Pen-y-Pass (known as the miners track) was easy, wide and flat and gave me time to look above to where the next stage of the walk would go. And I felt seriously intimidated. A more pleasant view was below us as we passed the little Lyn Teyrn and looked back to where we had walked.

The  ruins of a little row of cottages sits at the side of the lake and I tried to imagine what it must have been like to live there.

I kept looking back wishing I could go back 100 years or so to see the series of chimneys pushing out smoke from their heaths and people milling around.

Another thing that grabbed my attention and distracted me from my tired legs was a mound of rock, its near vertical strata having deposited a mass of boulders beneath it.

Pen y Pass felt like a metropolis with a large car park, café and shop, toilets and a huge and unattractive building housing a Youth Hostel and other accommodation.

According to my printed off bus timetable we had at least an hour to wait for our bus to take us back to our starting point. I tried to persuade Paul that we should hitch and for 10 minutes half-heatedly stuck my thumb out but Paul wasn’t keen and we weren’t in a hurry so we gave up. The bus arrived but then showed no sign of departing to the point where I asked the driver what the delay was. A more recent timetable was thrust into my hand which indicated another half an hour’s wait. Oh well, there are worse places to be hanging around.

Paul and I were staying in the middle of Blaenau Ffestiniog in an Air BnB – a tiny but comfortable slate workers cottage. Just around the corner is the studio of the sculptor David Nash – a bit of a hero of Paul’s. How about that! Here’s a pic that Paul took.