Finally: y Lliwedd

I've lived in North Wales for 11 years and I had never done the full Snowdon horseshoe. Or yr Wyddfa horseshoe, I should probably call it. That's not right! I really wanted to do it one day. But it's a bit of a hike on your own. But then I had someone to do that with, and it was summer so I had time. So it happened!

I suppose it is time my date should get a name. It is Neil. He came to pick me up from home, and together we went to Nant Peris to get the bus (the same bus as I had got with Vahid) to Pen y Pass. It was supposed to be a good day for it. Dry and mostly sunny, but not too hot. The day before it had been scorching.

We both rocked up in shorts and with a lot of water in our backpacks. I had about 6 litres with me! The disadvantage of doing a mountain ridge walk is that you don't come across any water along the way. But the start of the walk was actually quite cloudy.

When we started on the Pyg Track it was quite busy. But we got to the junction with the path to Crib Goch it became a lot quieter. We also rose out of the clouds. There was the occasional person that overtook us. And we came across a little group that we overtook.

When the clouds started to lift, still on Pyg Track

This group was worth mentioning. It was led by a mountain guide, and not just any of them; it was Rusty from Snowdonia Walking and Climbing. We had a little chat as he recognised me from the trip I had done with his company, although it had actually been led by one of his other guides. But there had been an incident on our trip with one of the participants, who had slipped, arrested his fall with his arms, and then had ended up with an arm that looked, but did not feel, like he had cramp. I brought that up. Rusty could tell me he had actually torn a tendon off his bone. He had needed surgery, and had been out of action for about a year. Oh dear! I had occasionally thought about this chap, and had wondered what actually happened to his arm, and whether it had hinder him after the trip. Unfortunately, I now knew that the answer to the second question was yes. 

By this time we were scrambling up towards the ridge. And on my request we had a cake break. Fine now my breakfast was a while ago. And the views were good. The ridge is always beautiful! And towards the south we could only see clouds, from above. Towards the north we could see the valley.

Clouds to the south, view to the north

When we got beyond Crib Goch we got a view on the ridge on the other side: Bwlch Ciliau, and y Lliwedd. The former was the site of a waterfall of clouds, but the latter was clear. We were still in blazing sunshine, and I was getting slightly uncomfortable. But we continued.

Impressive clouds cascading over Bwlch Ciliau

When there was a junction where you could either follow the ridge or skirt a bit below it, I suggested we skirt it, as I had done the ridge with Vahid. But that might not have been a good choice. The path became vague and seemed to vanish. Maybe we just lost it. But we were traversing a rather steep slope with quite a lot of scree. That's a bit uncomfortable! And I was getting hungry again. And when we found a nice piece of grass we had lunch. The views were even better now! 

After lunch we reached the ridge quite soon. And that was where it got busy again. And busier when we joined the Llanberis Path. And busier when the Miners’ track joined. And busier by the summit. We skipped the selfie queue and headed for the Watkin Path. And that descended into the cloud quite quickly. 

Busy on the summit 

It was lovely to get some cool! And the path starts steep and loose but that’s ok. We didn’t get much of the potential views but so be it. And at some point the pass becomes a lot less steep. It became a really gentle walk! And that way we came to the junction where the Watkin Path heads down the slope, while the path over y Lliwedd heads straight ahead. I was entering new terrain!

Y Lliwedd turns out to be not very scrambly, but it had pretty impressive cliffs. It was a nice path! We came over the two peaks still in the clouds. And we encountered something that looked like flying ants day gone horribly wrong. Carpets of dead and dying winged ants! I’d never seen anything like it. It was a bit sad.

On y Lliwedd

Ant massacre

Lower down we came out of the cloud, and sat down for second lunch. The view over Llyn Llydaw was amazing! And the sun wasn’t too hot. 

The clouds lifting

Llyn Llydaw 

We comfortably trundled down to the Miners’ Path, and then back to the car park. It had been a lovely hike! In good company. And I still had water at the end of it. All good! One ridge ticked off my to do list. I could imagine doing it again, but then coming down Watkin. I’ll have to look into how to sort that with buses. But for now this will stand as our biggest adventure yet! 

The lake from close up