Cwm Idwal with the Challenger conference

The Challenger Society describes itself as the foremost learned society representing the UK academic marine research community. Once every two years they have a conference. This year, it would be in Bangor. Tom was involved in the organisation, and he had sent an email around saying he wanted to include a few field trips in the program; would the usual suspect who lead trips into the field, like Dei and me, be willing to do the same for the conference? I said yes. And we agreed I would do the trip to Cwm Idwal.

I have done that trip many times; I don’t need to prepare for delivering the information. But close to the time I wanted to know what the logistics were. What time would the coach leave where, and what time did it need to be back? How many people would attend? The answer to the last question was: quite a few. I had just spoken with James, our new PhD student, and he offered to come along. I gratefully accepted that offer. 

On the day, I biked to the visitor centre. It’s about as far as to the office. It was great weather for it! When I got there I checked if the bloke we had given the mystery bag to was in, but he wasn’t. Then I just waited for the coach with conference people to turn up. It was quite early!

We were 29 in total. A big group! I was glad I had James. And we also had Sijing, one of our PhD students; she was also happy to help. Great! 

We did the trip counterclockwise as then you get to some good bits quicker. The audience had a few geologists in it, a few biologists, a bucket-load of physicists, and some undeclared people. And they had all chosen to be there. It was a lovely group! 

View on Tryfan

View on Llyn Idwal

We looked at the mountains, the syncline, the roches mouttonnées, the grass that gives away the presence of mafic rock, the lake, and the moraines. And I talked about the earliest British geologist who has been mapping here. And that Darwin had been one of them.

I had a great time, and I think the people in general did. We did have some people who walked rather slowly, though. And once you are at the far end of the lake you are committed to a fair walk back to the coach. I decided to do my last spiel everyone except the tail walkers. They need all the time to get back to the road. We were a little bit late, but the coach driver was relaxed about it. Fortunately!

When we had loaded everybody up I could accept my bike ride home. That practically downhill all the way. Very comfortable! I figured it had been a success. 

Group pic. Notice Sijing far left and James far right