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Silently we ate our pouch of hot food. "Are you feeling any better?", I asked. "I'm never doing that again!", she replied.
I had hoped this was going to be the highlight of our holiday. I had done it before, a year or 2 ago, when a group of very friendly Welshmen adopted me for one day and took me up and over Crib Goch.
But this time was different. Instead of a warm sun and no wind there were clouds and quite a strong wind. A few hours earlier, at Penn y Pass's parkingplace, it was clear it wasn't going to be an airless day. But nothing predicted it's force higher up. Well, maybe the sign warning for 55 mph on Snowdon's summit did, but hey, I'm an optimist. It couldn't be that bad, could it?
So heyho, heyho, it's off to Crib Goch we go. The Pyg track is a very friendly path. Well laid, with good views on Crib Goch's summit, it feeds the anticipatory fun. And after a slow but steady ascent we arrive at the junction with the Crib Goch route. It's posing time.
And a view back towards the Pyg track:
I'd forgotten the first part after the junction is still a path, in my memory the walk turned into a scramble straight away. View towards Llanberris Pass:
And the route we took from there:
The wind was really starting to pick up from here on. The mrs, more sceptical by the minute is scrambling her way up:
Just before the scramble started, we had been overtaken by some fellow walkers. Some of them were having a short break on the summit, waiting for 2 from their group who were going at a lower speed. Here they are battling against the wind:
Classic shot:
Here we are at the summit, with the mrs not particularly looking forward to what lies ahead
After a small chat, the others engage on the ridge:
And we follow soon after:
Coming down one of the pinnacles:
And peeking past the last pinnacle towards Crib y Ddysgl:
And the final scramble up the last pinnacle:
Pffffff. And it's done. Time for a break, recatching our breath and eating the pouch of hot food. "Are you feeling better?"
"I don't want to go anymore. Is there an easy way down from here?" We're at the saddle. And I doubt I'm the first to ever have made this mistake. On our left, there's some (erosion) miniature stone chutes that I mistake for man made paths. "I guess we could go down here, looks quite doable."
But I'll give anyone this advice: don't. It's steep, it's unpleasant, and it definately is no fun.
And through the clouds we hear a rescue helicopter. Or at least we think we do, I couldn't find any info about that afternoon on MR websites.
The mrs trying to locate the sound:
So agreed. We'll never do Crib Goch again (at least not together
), but we will visit Snowdonia again.