The weather was so good I couldn't resist a day out on Snowdon. As soon as I dropped my youngest at Primary School I was off for a bit of soloing on Clogwyn y Garnedd and the conditions didn't disappoint - it was a stunning day. I climbed Great Gully II/III (230m) which was in Alpine condition and well worth doing as well as Right Hand Trinity which was a bit lean today which merited a grade top end III or even IV (150m) this was due to it being bashed about by many parties and the crux was passing the huge chockstone on the right on mixed ground. It was well worth it though.
Well, what glorious weather we're having. The weather couldn't have been better to run a Single Pitch Award Training courses this weekend. I was working for Plas y Brenin with 4 students who were really keen to consolidate/learn and contribute to the course but, unfortunately, they had to put up with my croaky voice due to a bit of a cold.
We went to Lion Rock (Fachen) on Saturday and the Upper Tier of Pant Ifan (Tremadog) today. The photo was taken today l to r - Pete C, Matt, Pete M and Chris.
There is still hope that the winter will stay with us. Yesterday the temperature at home was a tropical 13.5 and a lot of the snow had disappeared but we have enough to carry us over a mild spell I hope. With that in mind and a freezing level of 1000m we ventured on to
Snowdon to see what was available. Not a lot as it happened but not far off as there was lots of snow still around and all it will take is a drop in temperature and the snow should get transformed to perfect
neve. Unfortunately it wasn't quite right today with very soft snow making the going tough and that was just getting to the bottom of the routes on
Clogwyn y
Garnedd so we decided to cut our losses and just go for the top of
Snowdon for a look around but unfortunately the visibility was very poor from about 700m.
There were also signs of avalanches all along the
PYG track below Crib
Goch (see above photo)which may have been triggered by the sun and warm weather yesterday. The snow pack was wet down to the grass which wasn't frozen until about 900m but there was still quite a lot of ice still around.
The forecast is for the freezing level to drop to 800m tomorrow but with gales of 50mph above 500m so I think it may be a
cragging day tomorrow.
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We had a lovely walk from Betws y Coed to Llyn Elsi and then down Sarn Helen (the old Roman road) with some spectacular views of the Carneddau with a good covering of snow. The photo was taken by my other son Garmon on his phone.
Well, what a difference a day makes. Thursday was a beautiful cold crisp day but due to the conditions on the high mountains we stayed low and walked from
Betws y Coed to
Penmachno. We covered navigation skills and finished off at about 7 p.m. in the pub in
Penmachno.
Friday was horrendous - full on thaw and strong winds. I decided that a shorter walk was in order so we travelled from Capel Curig to Ty Hyll via Llyn Crafnant and Llyn Geirionnydd.
I was climbing with Rich today who had travelled all the way from Bristol to take advantage of the fantastic winter condition we have at the moment. It was relatively quiet today with most people spread across a good selection of routes. Afon Ifan (Idwal Stream) II/III, South Gully IV, Central Route III, Chicane Gully III, The Ramp II, The Screen III/IV, The Devils Pasture III and The Devils Cellar IV were all in condition and climbed today. We climbed The Devils Cellar IV (with the direct start V) and Central Route III both of which were in fantastic condition.
The photo is of Rich on the direct start of The Devils Cellar (V).
Went out with Steve today to have a look at Tryfan. I must say the most difficult part of the day was the condition of the snow - it was very much one step up and 2 or 3 steps down. The snow was very unconsolidated with no base. We think we managed to squeeze a new route between Green Gully and Deffing out the Ben which was about grade 5 up to the point were we had to retreat due to a lack of time (the condition of the snow was really time consuming) but it looked like we would have finished up Green Gully anyway. I think we'll wait for better conditions before returning. A good day out though.
I was surprised how little ice there was around today. We had an early start this morning but by the time we got to the bottom of the Black Ladders Andy wasn't feeling very well so we changed plans and went for Crib Lem via David instead. By the time we got to the start of the ridge Andy was suffering badly so we decided that the strong wind and spindrift wouldn't help matters so we decided to head for home.
There were loads of people out today but I guess most of them would be aiming at the mixed routes or just going for a walk. It wasn't freezing that hard up high and as we descended we encountered rain.
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