How not to climb a mountain - my adventure on Mt Snowdon

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"It's easy", they said.

"There were girls doing it in flip flops", they said.

Apparently the 3 hour trek up Mt Snowdon, in Snowdonia National Park in Gwynedd, Northern Wales, is a piece of cake. Except if you're me.

My roomates in Caernarfon told me it would be easy, though it would take about 5 hours up and back. Okay, thought I, I'll set off early, do the trek and chill out in Caernarfon for the afternoon. A nice easy day before I head off to Dublin.

Evidently the gods were bored last Thursday.

I should have realised something was going to go wrong when I woke up and it was raining. But I pushed on determinedly, packing my waterproof jacket and some lunch just in case. I managed to catch my bus at 8:40am and even got off in the right town to make my connection (well, I say "town", but Beddgelert is really just a little village in the middle of nowhere). By this time it was pouring.

Then I saw my connecting bus fly by. It was 2 hours until the next one.

At this point I began to get a little discouraged.

Thankfully, the bus which had dropped me in Beddgelert turned up at that moment on its way back to Caernarfon. The bus driver told me that if he got me back to Caernarfon on time, I could catch a bus from there to Llanberis and connect to my destination, Pen-y-Pass. Fine, thought I. It was still only 9:30 so I had plenty of time.

Unfortunately for me, every single Welsh person between Beddgelert and Caernarfon wanted to get on the bus that day. We arrived in Caernarfon just as the number 88 bus pulled out, bound for Llanberis. This meant another 30 minute wait.

Cold and now very discouraged, I sat at the bus stop in Caernarfon and watched the buses pull in and out. Half an hour went by and my bus didn't show.

"Cccchanberrris?" asked the old Welsh man next to me. I just looked at him.

"Cccchanberrris?" he asked again. "Are you going to Ccccchanberrris?"

"Oh," I said politely, "no, I'm off to Lahnberris."

The man looked at me with a mixture of sympathy and pity as the penny dropped and I realised I'd been unwittingly butchering his mother tongue (apparently in Welsh, the "ll" sound is pronounced "Ch"). He then proceeded to tell me to take care as someone had fallen off the mountain the previous evening before toddling off to catch his bus. It was at this point that I began to have doubts, but I'd already wasted so much of my day on trying to get to the damn mountain that I wasn't going to give up at this point.

Surprisingly, once my bus finally came and I got to Llanberis, the connection to Pen-y-Pass was very smooth. I was the only person on the bus so the bus driver gave me an imprompu tour of the areas we passed through and a list of places I should visit while I was staying in northern Wales.

My roommate had told me that once I got off the bus I was to turn right and follow all the people. Because of the inclement weather, I was the only person in the parking lot, but I determinedly set off for the right-hand path and began to climb.

Apart from the pouring rain, the climb itself was fairly uneventful and though I didn't see too many people during the first part of the hike, as I got closer to the summit the traffic began to back up a little. It began to get really steep and slippery. I passed a group of teenagers with packs on - poor bastards - who were finding it pretty tough, and after about 2 1/2 hours someone on their way down informed me that I was almost there - only about 20 minutes to go. That 20 minutes was the steepest, most difficult of the entire journey!

I'd love to say that I experienced the spectacular views that most tourists get upon reaching the summit of the second highest mountain in the UK, but unfortunately just as I began to make my final ascent the mist rolled in. When I finally made it to the top I couldn't see ten metres in front of me, let alone the view to both oceans I'd been promised. I was freezing and wet and slightly miserable but managed to get my photo taken by the group of English kids who reached the top at the same time as me. I couldn't stay long as I was beginning to lose feeling in my fingers so after about five minutes I began the long climb down.

About 20 minutes into my descent, the rain stopped, the clouds cleared and the sun came out. Of course. But the scenery on the trek back to the carpark was beautiful and I will post photos as soon as I find a computer with a USB port.

Unfortunately the gods weren't finished laughing at me yet. Five minutes before I got back to the carpark the mist rolled in again and the downpour began. By the time I reached the carpark to wait for the bus I was freezing, soaking, exhausted and sore, having fallen twice during my descent. The bus was late and consequently I missed my connection in Llanberis by 5 minutes. The next bus wasn't for another hour and 40 minutes. At this point, I began to really hate Wales.

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Comments

[Syanna]

Oh man...
I hate days like that. I'm so sorry! Wow, so off to Ireland huh? That is pretty sweet. Better luck to ya!

[Erin]

Awwww hun!
Chalk it down to a story to tell the grandkiddies ( and a way of either working off bad karma or earning good karma!) At least the lovly accents would soothe it a little