A climb, a walk and some good company

It recently dawned on us that we hadn’t been to Wales for over a year – which meant we had never taken the van there. Over the first May bank holiday weekend we rectified this with a splendid few days in north and south Snowdonia.

Amphitheatre Buttress on Craig yr Ysfa in the Carneddau has been on our wish list for several years. Described as a “long mountain adventure”, we thought it would be both a gentle reintroduction to rock climbing (another thing we hadn’t done for over a year – incidentally since the last Wales trip), and a good warm-up for the Alps. So this was our main target for the weekend – and it looked like the weather was going to play ball…

Unfortunately MWIS was uncharacteristically optimistic, and when we woke up on Saturday morning to distinctly cold and cloudy skies, we were amused to notice that yesterday’s prediction of “extensive sunshine” had been altered to “almost no sunshine” ten minutes previously. Only slightly daunted, we headed up the mountain anyway. It was a good decision: although we found the rock cold on the first pitch, there were no real weather-related difficulties and being able to hear each other over the refreshing lack of wind made a nice change.

Despite not starting particularly early, we were first on the route. The bottom slabs didn’t look quite gentle enough not to pitch, and in fact we thought these presented some of the toughest moves – but maybe that was just our rustyness. The crux was steeper and nicely exposed but with good holds, and after that we moved together. A few gendarmes and a genuinely knife-edged ridge made for an entertaining penultimate section! Overall, a fantastic route with great views and isolated mountain setting (especially when compared to the crowds on topping out) – easily deserving of its classic status. To finish the day we ran up Carnedd Llewelyn and Pen yr Helgi Du before descending the ridge (and bog, and hopping a wall) to Gwern Gof Isaf.

Over tea and crisps, we decided to head south to join friends on the CUHWC trip to Bryn Golau in Dinas Mawddwy for the remainder of the weekend, and enjoyed a sociable couple of evenings in the bunkhouse (returning to the much more comfortable van to sleep!). On Sunday we walked on the always-pleasant Arans, and managed to fit in a quick ascent of almost-deserted Maesglase (a hill previously admired, but never before climbed) on Monday morning.