The UK isn’t particularly well known for its mountainous hikes, it is well known for its prolific walking culture however. There are some very old (and random) rules about access etc, but either way there are walks shooting off all over the countryside. The UK has a challenge, called “The Three Peaks Challenge”, which is to climb the three highest peaks of Wales, England and Scotland in 24 hours. We aren’t doing that. We’ve changed it to 3 peaks in one week! A sensible alteration in my opinion!
Mount Snowdon isn’t that tall (1058m), until you look at it from the car park and then it doesn’t seem like a very sensible idea at all!
Sensibly, there is a train that you can take up to the top of Mount Snowdon, on special grasp tracks so that the tiny hard working engine won’t slip backwards.
We were not sensible.
The wide sweeping hills of Mount Snowdon are hard to capture in one shot, and even when there is a sheep “for scale”, it doesn’t really give a good indication of scale!
Some points of the walk got a bit scrabbly and required short steps and some good foot placement. I’m not well known for good foot placement, so there was some ongoing commentary about being uncoordinated (usually in loud yelps!).
We could see the weather was coming in as we neared the top. To be fair, the weather had come in and receded several times while we were hiking.
As the fog rolled in rather dramatic swirls of misty cloud, we knew that we would have a typical summit shot of Mount Snowdon, seeing nothing! However at least at this point it wasn’t raining. It had come in quite cold however!
Everyone has a different opinion on their preferred traverse, up or down. Except for the fitness issues, I prefer up. It requires much less thought, not a huge amount of control and is generally easier on the body. Down, on the other hand, requires careful foot placement, good body alignment (or else you’ll topple A over T), muscle control (no stomping down a hill here) and general concentration. After a while on the downwards scramble, I tend to get jelly legs. I got jelly legs.
All the while, the clouds turned into a slight amount of rain and the sweat that you gained in the heat of climbing up, has now turned to being a chilly dampness all over you (so it’s layers on and off, on and off, on and off, to keep warm).
It took us five hours and 20 mins and we covered just over 15kms (the guidebook says that fit experienced walkers will take 6 hours, but I think they are being kind!).
We stopped at Swallow Falls on our way out of Snowdonia, just for some additional serenity.
From here it was a quick skip back to Liverpool for a comfy bed and some much needed washing! Before we think about the tallest peak in England in the Lakes District, Scafell….. and more jelly legs!!
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