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Ah, a short one but a good one. Two of the best 100 (according to Trail) mountains in the country, and depending on where my main training trip before the Cambrian Way takes me, this stretch could see me pass through the halfway mark in the Trail 100. But then if it doesn't, it will … Continue reading Planning the Cambrian Way – Part 7: Dinas Mawddwy to Barmouth
A quick section to plan this one. On paper of a similar length to the previous section, I knew I could knock this one out quickly, so that's what I've done. It may be longer and hillier (slightly) than stage 3, but it's not caught my imagination in the same way. In part this is … Continue reading Planning the Cambrian Way – Part 6: Devil’s Bridge to Dinas Mawddwy
Assuming that I don't roll into Llandovery a bedraggled and broken mess of a walker, and head promptly for home, I'll depart Llandovery and enter a whole new world - one of deep valleys, woods and wild rounded hills. It looks absolutely enchanting, and whilst it clearly won't match the more dramatic scenery a couple … Continue reading Planning the Cambrian Way – Part 5: Llandovery to Devil’s Bridge
Could this be the most problematic section of the walk to plan ? It was certainly starting to look that way. It's the longest section according to my initial carve up and with me needing to make sweeping assumptions about the daily distances I could make by predicting my fitness and the effect of any … Continue reading Planning the Cambrian Way – Part 4: Abergavenny to Llandovery
It seems no one spotted the "deliberate" mistake in my last planning post - indeed I was even complimented on the reasonableness of my 24 day schedule. Except, if you'd added up the days for each section you'd have come up with 27, making it even more reasonable. It was only sitting down to start … Continue reading Planning the Cambrian Way – Part 3: Cardiff to Abergavenny (Stage 1)
I've now had a chance to walk through the route on Anquet, referring to the Cambrian Way book and the various blog accounts of the walk I'm using to assist in the planning. Not wanting to plunge into the detailed working out of daily walks and where to stop overnight at this stage - it's … Continue reading Planning the Cambrian Way – Part 2: The First Rough Plan
How do you go about planning such a long walk ? Leaving aside the doing the walk itself, which is a formidable enough challenge in its own right, the thought of also having to turn a blank sheet of paper into a fully formed plan for the walk would definitely scare some people off. For … Continue reading Planning the Cambrian Way – Part 1: The Approach
I stood outside Llandudno Junction station waiting for Rich, due a few minutes after me, little realising that Lee was already there sitting in his car about 100ft away. Rich arrived and we stood around like spare parts waiting for Lee to turn up and luckily he realised we were there when, bored with the … Continue reading 2 Days in the Southern Carneddau
Our annual gathering of ex-university friends saw us take a cottage in the Hiraethog area of North Wales. Although not a primarily walking-focussed holiday, we did get out a few times: Â Sunday 8 April: Easter in the Hiraethog A group walk across the moor to the summit of the Marilyn Mwdwl-eithin. We walked along … Continue reading Snowdonia April 2012
Snowdon (or to give the actual summit its correct name, Yr Wyddfa) is probably Britain's most touristy mountain, but under the right conditions can also be a serious mountain on which people die or hurt themselves every year. Â This post is dedicated to the melting pot and mountain of contrasts that is Snowdon and the … Continue reading Snowdon from various angles
Tryfan and the Glyders are wreathed in cloud as I sit here in the cottage writing this. Patches of sunlight highlighting the yellows of the moor. Yesterday we were up there, as my legs and in particular my knees are reminding me. We picked a good day for it, although the range of weather we … Continue reading Getting Some Rock
"The where ?" I can almost hear people asking. Â Mynydd Hiraethog, often just called the Hiraethog is an area of moorland between Denbigh and the A5 in the north east of Wales. Â It lies just outside the Snowdonia National Park, and so doesn't get quite the same level of footfall. Â There's not much there apart … Continue reading Easter in the Hiraethog
Given the weather, which has been windy every day and wet most days, I've had a reasonably successful trip. The only slight regret was losing Sunday, but that might not have been a great success anyway given my injury - I'm sure a day's rest helped, although I'm still in pain as I write this … Continue reading Snowdonia 2011 – Debrief
On this trip I stayed in two places: YHA Snowdon Ranger. When I found I couldn't book the B&B for all 7 nights, I went for the obvious option for the first night. It's just down the road from Beddgelert. Unlike recent experiences though, this time I had to share a room but I did … Continue reading Snowdonia 2011 – Accommodation and Meals
The Nantlle Ridge The whole trip has been built around doing this and it's my last day so it's obvious what walk to do. I deliberately left this to last because today had the best weather forecast and it's also the hardest walk - in that it's an all or nothing walk and although there … Continue reading Snowdonia 2011 – Day 7