15th April

Yesterday I rode my motorbike over to Snowdonia and climbed the Snowdon Horseshoe. Beautiful warm sunny weather and tremendous scenery went to make a glorious, if exhausting, day in the mountains. The last time I went to Snowdonia was about ten years ago and then it was to walk the Horseshoe. The climb involves a long scramble up Crib Goch and then a 2 kilometre traverse along a knife edge of a ridge with a sheer drop of about 500 metres in places. In other parts the walk is a 1000 metre high scramble on an extremely narow path. Not a place for those who have no head for heights. After getting to the summit of Snowdon there is a very rough descent to a col followed by another steep climb to Y Lliwedd, which is the killer on this route. The walk down from Y Lliwedd meets up eventually with the Miners track which leads back to the car park. It is about eight miles long and is described as the most famous Grade 1 scramble in Britain. Interestingly the first half of the walk up to the Summit of Snowdon was crowded with people, whilst on the second half of the climb to Y Llliwed there was hardly anyone to be seen. Today I ache in a way that I haven't ached for a long time; but neither have I exerted myself that much for a long time either, on what must have been the hardest walk I have done for over ten years. Attached in Flickr are a few pictures of the ridge. http://www.flickr.com/photos/13615080@N00/