Padarn Country Park and Snowdon

Tuesday 1st September 2015

Following the fantastic weather at the end of my previous day's walk, it was to very different weather that I started the next day, and on this occasion it never really improved throughout the day, but I was still able to have an enjoyable walk. My initial plan for this holiday was for me to take new routes up the familiar mountains of Snowdonia, but later I had the idea to also visit the tops of all fifteen mountains in Snowdonia that are over three thousand feet high. Sometime after that I realised that this would mean I would have to go up Crib Goch, the knife-edge ridge beside Snowdon, which terrifies me. Every time I have been over Crib Goch I have not enjoyed it as I’m not great with heights so the thought of going up again just so I could complete a list was not pleasant. I’d already devised a new route up Snowdon and it didn’t involve going over Crib Goch. For many years I have been frustrated by the lack of walker’s paths in Nant Peris, which is an area of awesome rock scenery abounding in climber’s routes, so I had hoped to try and forge a route up, but in the end it was the weather that had the final say.

Near Nant Peris, and Llanberis, is the Padarn Country Park, which is a predominantly wooded area on the slopes above Llyn Padarn in an area of disused quarries. The weather didn’t prevent me from exploring this fascinating area of old quarries so first thing in the very damp morning I passed through Llanberis and past the National Slate Museum into the country park. The first notable feature that I saw was the remains of Vivian Quarry; a huge scar in the hillside like some enormous digger has scraped away the earth in the side of the hill, and is a feature that cannot be missed from Llanberis. This is now a diving centre, but I was happy to walk around it so I took a path that steeply climbs the hillside beside the old quarry past many fascinating, old mining buildings until I reached a barrier that proclaimed that due to a collapsed retaining wall the path beyond was closed. The diversion took me along an excellent old miner’s path along the side of the hill through the woodland until I eventually climbed above the trees and doubled back on myself towards Vivian Quarry.

This was a delightful little walk despite the rain that fell briefly while I was walking through the wood, but had stopped by the time I was passing above the top of Vivian Quarry. Near Padarn Country Park is a vast area of old slate quarries with a public footpath that passes through the old workings and I had long wanted to walk along it. I had an awesome experience walking through the shattered landscape that, despite patches of heather and gorse, nature seemed to be unable to reclaim. For safety reasons the wide track of my route was carefully restricted with high wire fences that proscribed a winding route past the gouged rock faces and piles of slag. Underneath these old slate quarries is now an enormous pumped storage power station generating hydroelectric energy from the reservoir two thousand feet up on the side of Elidir Fawr. I had been at the top of this mountain the previous day and seen the reservoir that feeds the power station, and now I was walking across the mountain's lower slopes past the high-pressure shafts that carry the water down to the turbines.

The sun made an attempt to peep out from behind Snowdon as I made my way down the winding track providing me with a stunning view up Nant Peris, but by the time I reached the bottom of the valley it had started to rain again and this time it would be hours before it stopped. I abandoned my original plan of trying to find a route up the steep sides of Nant Peris and just walked back into Llanberis. On the outskirts of Llanberis I diverted left to the start of the popular Llanberis Path up Snowdon. This is the easiest route up Snowdon, but I can’t remember the last time I went up it. I think I went down the Llanberis Path in bad weather in 2009, but I think you may have to go all the way back to early 2004 when I climbed Snowdon with a group. The rain didn’t stop during the whole duration of my walk up Snowdon, but I actually quite enjoyed the climb. There were many other people climbing Snowdon despite the poor weather and I had to wonder how cold they were going to be when they got to the top as many of them seemed to be totally unprepared for the conditions.

I was able to enjoy my slow amble up the Llanberis Path with almost no wind for most of the climb until I reached Bwlch Glas, not far from the summit, where a bitingly cold wind appeared that prompted me to put my gloves on and wrap up warm for the final stretch up to the top. I used to go up Snowdon at least once a year but after 2012 I had stopped coming so I was happy to be able to finally renew my acquaintance with an old friend as I reached the summit of Snowdon for the seventeenth time. I didn’t stay at the top for very long but soon started to make my way back down coming off the Llanberis Path at Bwlch Glas turning left onto the Snowdon Ranger Path. I have been on the Snowdon Ranger Path many times before, and quite liked it, but I’ve never been all the way down to the Snowdon Ranger Hut at the bottom, and I didn’t on this occasion either. For many years I had wanted to use this particular route as a means for going to or from Llanberis so in the vein of doing new routes up familiar mountains I set off down the north-western ridge of Snowdon.

On reaching the edge of the open access land I turned right uphill to Bwlch Maesgwm onto a good, clear bridlepath that leads into the valley of Maesgwm. The weather on this walk was very different to the one the day before, although as I emerged below the clouds I could see that there was some astonishingly good weather on the surrounding hills. Despite this I felt like I’d made the most of the weather with an enjoyable walk through the quarries and I felt like I had met an old friend again in going up Snowdon. The weather was clearing towards the end of the day, even on Snowdon, with views across the valley to the Llanberis Path and the Snowdon Mountain Railway that gave me a pleasurable walk back down to the Llanberis Youth Hostel. The following morning I drove to the foot of Tryfan, but when I got there it was pouring it down with rain. After sitting in my car for several minutes I decided that I didn’t want to climb Tryfan in that weather, so I started the engine and drove all the way back home. Despite the wet end to this holiday and failing to climb all fifteen tops, I think I had an enjoyable holiday.