Mountain Lifestyle: The days are just packed...

Monday 19 June 2017

The days are just packed...

When the weather is this good and it's almost mid-summer, it's amazing what you can pack into a day! Got back to The Cottage quite late last night and early next morning, I was dealing with this!....

As part of my outdoor qualifications, I have to undergo a two-day First Aid course every three years, to ensure that I am current and up to date. As I've basically had a pretty busy timetable recently, this was the only time that I could fit one in, so I didn't even have time to unpack before I was back out of the door. I must admit, I was a bit gutted to be on a course when the weather was so spectacular! We did however, get a 25 minute lunch break, which was just long enough to go and dive in the lake at Llanberis!

I don't think the thermometer has ever been so high here in Wales! It was a well needed and very refreshing swim, before getting back to the afternoon first aid session.

As soon as the course finished, I drove home, stopping briefly again to dive in the lake! I met Rusty just after 6pm and we carried on up into Cwm Idwal, where The Slabs were fully in the sunshine and amazingly, no one was about. There was not a breath of wind, yet the temperature remained in the mid to high twenties.

For speed, we moved together up 'Hope' (V.Diff), then onto 'Lazarus', (Severe, 4a).

With the absence of any wind, the midges came out in force half way up and despite the heat, we had to cover up for the last pitch - 'Groove Above' (H.S, 4b), which has a pretty desperate start to get into the groove (see pic below). Tonight though, there was no time for faffing - we'd have got eaten alive; so charged upwards as fast as we could.

A short ropeless continuation took us to the top of the rocks and over into the Nameless Cwm.

As the sun was clipping the top of Y Garn, we set off up Ceniefion Arete, solo.

It's such a fantastic scramble anyway but doing it in the pink glow of the evening sun was really special.

We topped out at about 9pm, but the sun was far from setting.

Tryfan and Glyder Fach were glowing as we walked back down, past Cwm Bochllwyd.

And in the distance, the Ogwen River glistened in the bottom of the Nant Ffrancon Valley. Magical stuff.

Although I'd still not had dinner, we stopped off at the classic 'Douglas Arms' for a celebratory shandy on the way home. It's amazing how much you can fit into a day...