Monday 29 December - Moel-ddu & Moel Hebog

Moel-ddu (SH 57965 44212; 552m) & Moel Hebog (SH 56519 46963; 783m)

Start Point: Car park by the dam at Llyn Cwmystradllyn 

Weather: Another sunny day, albeit with an unfortunately stubborn cloud sitting atop Moel Hebog. A stiffer breeze than forecast, and being northerly, it was bitingly cold.

Distance and Ascent: 11.8km, 850m

 

Faffing in the car after arriving at Cwmystradllyn this morning, Mick observed that it looked a bit breezy out. He wasn't wrong, despite the Met Office having told me that the wind would be negligible. As that wind was northerly, and as temperatures have been low for a few days now, I knew I was in for a chilly outing.

 

After peeling off from the good track that had taken me so far up towards Moel-ddu, I didn't entirely follow the route I'd plotted, and I'm not sure whether the small distance I saved by cutting a corner outweighed the extra distance with a trodden line at least part of the way (I wasn't trying to cut a corner; I'd followed an ATV track that then started heading off downhill, at which point I took a direct line to the bwlch to the west of my objective, from where I saw a good trodden line coming over the nobble to the west of there, which had been my intended route).  

 

I skirted the final nobble before climbing a wall stile and heading up towards the summit, at which point I looked back behind me and realised that the nobble I'd just skirted looked approximately the same height as where I was going. A quick bit of Googling told me it was under 3m lower, which (balanced with how close it was) I adjudged to be worth the short backtrack to visit it for insurance against a future survey changing where the summit lies. 

 

I was soon at the actual top, and what a fine place it was to be. In fact, this entire outing was quite excellent.

 

Looking again at my recorded route, I wonder whether following the public footpath down to the 'Settlement' would have been a better choice, but then there was nothing difficult about the line I took. From the next dip in the landscape, I'd intended to head up and over the next lump that lay in my way, but starting having second thoughts about whether it would be more efficient to go over or to go around. After contemplating the point for far too long I decided that I was spending longer thinking about it than it would take to just get on with it and go over the top, so off I set again ... and after 50m of ascent I got drawn by an invisible force and skirted it. In hindsight, a good enough choice, I think. 

 

I knew that I would join the route of the Paddy Buckley Round as I approached Moel Hebog, and thus expected to find a trodden line. That I did and I managed to more-or-less follow it for most of the way up. At the top of the steep bit of the climb, another couple of walkers hove into view - the first I'd seen since I set out, although they passed too far from me for a greeting beyond a wave. 

 

As I'd set out I'd been optimistic that the cloud enveloping the top would have lifted by the time I got there, but it was proving stubborn. Thus it was a frozen world with no view. A minute or so after I arrived at the trig point, and before I went wandering off to find the actual high point, a couple of chaps joined me. They were unimpressed by the summit conditions, to which I observed that it did seem as if the only cloud in the entire area was sitting on this summit - it was a sore point for them as they were only on this hill today as the forecast had told them that the hills would be clearer towards the west. 

 

They were soon back off, and after a bit of wandering around, I headed off myself, just as another couple arrived, and soon passed (again, at a remove such that only waves were exchanged) a group of seven. So, 13 people seen, all within about 500m of the summit, and nobody for the other 11km!

 

There's possibly a better route for getting back to the dam car park, but the one I took worked well enough, in that it got me down without incident (and with stiles/gates over all walls) other than plunging my feet into a bog just before I reached the track on the N side of the llyn. That's the only foot-plunging in four days of hills, in December. There are benefits to largely frozen ground!

 

Despite all the spanners that have been thrown into the works this year, I met my target of reaching my 600th Marilyn summit, and with a whole 2 days to spare. Given the continuing good forecast, I would have proposed staying another night and going up one of the bigger hills tomorrow, but I have good reason to need to be at home. So, I shall now live in fear of one of my summits being demoted or a summit moved before I get up any more hills!

 

Blogger has decided we're going with photos in reverse order today: 

 

600th Marilyn summit selfie

Bit of rime ice up there!

Atop Moel-ddu, with cloud still stubbornly clinging to Moel Hebog behind me. 

Taken as I set out, with the choppiness of the llyn evidencing that the forecast <10mph wind was overly optimistic. I was, however, optimistic that the cloud would lift from Moel Hebog (the lump on the left ... the one under the cloud). 

Sunday 28 December - Gyrn Ddu (SH 401 467; 522m)

Weather: Glorious, but icy out of the sun

Start Point: service road (section of old road), immediately opposite start of footpath at SH 385 467

Distance and ascent: 6km, 480m

 

I think that, ignoring for a moment the issue of the summit, this was the most enjoyable outing of the 9 hills thus far on this trip. I'd not invited Mick to come with me on the basis that I didn't think it would be his cup of tea, but with hindsight he would have enjoyed coming as far as the point that I left the public footpath and struck off across access land.

A zig-zagging track had taken me up to the ruins of several mining buildings, then to three abandoned farmhouses, one in ruins, the others empty but still boasting roofs and windows. 

It was by the first of those farmhouses that I initially set out up the hill, but I'd not got far when I contemplated further my surroundings and read again the notes I'd made, whereupon I did an about turn to continue a little further along the right of way. A gate then took me onto the access land, and to a hole through the next wall.  

That landed me in a field with the choice of a vast network of sheep trods through gorse. For a while, all went well with my choices at forks, until the trod I was on petered out. The going wasn't overly hard, just prickly with some sections of boulders thrown in. 

Those boulders were, however, nothing compared to the huge heap of the things that forms the summit. My snap below doesn't do justice to the scale. Even though I had read that it was bouldery, and had put an emboldened comment on my notes not to do this one in wet conditions or low cloud, it was still something of a surprise to see what lay ahead of me. 

Extreme care was taken in clambering up to the top, and even then some surprisingly large boulders moved under me. 

My thought of dropping off the summit to the W was abandoned quickly, when I found how icy the boulders were on that side, and I picked my way back down the east side. There's actually a good strip of heathery earth that covers the boulders for some distance, so the amount of clambering required isn't quite as much as it looks from a distance (although there are still some surprising holes in amongst the heather). 

In the latter stages of my ascent to the big jumble of rocks, I'd come across a trodden line, so I followed it on the way down. It was less direct, but smooth and largely free of gorse obstructions. It felt like it would be a matter of extreme chance to stumble upon it, and continue to follow it, on the way uphill - particularly as it joined a much more obvious and eroded trod towards the bottom end (route hint: find your way to SH 39779 46442 and it's probably pretty easy to follow heading uphill from there).

The temperature plummeted again once I got onto the shady side of the hill, with the ground still frozen solid.

For ease of logistics, I only had two hills on the agenda for today, and I did one of them yesterday, so I was all done in time to take Mick out for lunch. 

Incidentally, that was my 598th Marilyn...

This is where I decided I'd turned uphill at least one wall too soon, but before I retreated I took a quick snap of the pleasing view.

I don't think this snap really conveys the scale of that mound of boulders.

Summit view 

I do like a good and obvious 'the path is this way' indication when crossing a field, and this one was just that.
 

 

Saturday 27 December - 6 Lleyn Peninsula Marilyns

Weather: Wall-to-wall sunshine. Icy cold in the shade, but by the middle of the day feeling relatively warm (emphasis on the 'relative' part of that description) in the sunshine. 

Carneddol (SH 30119 33100; 236m)

Start Point: Gateway at SH 30448 33213 - there's plenty of waiting space opposite

Distance and ascent:  0.8km, 70m 

There are two approaches to hills that aren't on access land and aren't served by public rights of way or permissive paths: consent or stealth/forgiveness. I made this my first hill of the day, arriving just as it became light enough to see without a torch, and went for the latter approach.

As soon as I'd made sure that Mick didn't reverse into any mud whilst turning around, before parking, I hopped over a gate and made haste up a rough grazing field of sheep. Such haste had I made in my departure that I hadn't picked up a hat or gloves, nor had I changed my fleece for a proper jacket. By the top, I was regretting the lack of gloves in particular - there was frost on the ground and my poor little fingers were burning. However, knowing that I'd be back in the warm within 20 minutes (within 15 minutes, as it turned out), I wasn't in fear of them dropping off!

  

 Quick snap of sunrise as I set out up the field, before Mick even has the engine off

Summit selfie, and view to the north

Mynydd Anelog (SH 15198 27222, 191m)

Start Point: Rough parking area in front of chapel at SH 155 263

Distance and Ascent: 2.3km, 130m

Mynydd Anelog is the most westerly Marilyn on the Lleyn Peninsula*, and after the quick detour to do Carneddol at dawn, I was going to work my way east through all the others. This is another 'if I'd known then' one, as I passed within 300m (linear) and 60m (vertical) of its summit when I walked this section of the Wales Coast Path in September 2014; I started my Marilyn campaign in November 2014. (*there is also Bardsey Island, which I won't be doing as the £50 ferry fare is too steep for me to justify when there are quite a few other Marilyns that I will never summit.) 

 

This one was another an easy walk - although if you look carefully at my recorded route you'll see that I initially overshot the not-overly-obvious turn up to the top - and an excellent viewpoint of a summit. 

 

Summit view
  

As above but with me in the way

 

View down to the coast path

On the approach, and from a different angle, I'd pondered whether it was a heron or some sort of a gull, sitting on something I couldn't see. Turned out it was a bag caught on a fence!

 

We had a brief pause in Aberdaron on our way to the next hill, in the same car park that was the scene of Mick & I losing each other in September 2014. Mobile signal is still poor there! 

 

Mynydd Rhiw (SH 228 293; 305m)

Start Point: At road end to the SW

Distance and Ascent: 2km, 65m

I thought Mick might join me on this one, but he declined on the basis of not being suitably dressed and on the further basis of it being warm and comfortable in Erica but cold outside. I couldn't disagree with his assessment, as to this point each hill had been colder than the one before (it wasn't 10am yet). 

There's not much to say about this one, other than that it continued the theme of being a good viewpoint. There's a lot of low-lying farmland on the Lleyn Peninsula, meaning that the Marilyns really stand out. I was back at the start within 20 minutes, and that included a few minutes at the summit. 

The hood wasn't just for warmth - the wind was trying to whip my cap off.

Carn Fadryn (SH 278 351; 371m)

Start Point: parking area to the NW of the old chapel in Garnfadryn.

Distance and Ascent: 2.4km, 195m

 

On the way up, at a fork, I opted for the more attacking route, which I came to regret as it became a narrow trod through heather. I took the main path on the way back.

I'd originally intended to visit the Lleyn Peninsula in July, parking Bertie-the-Motorhome on a Temporary Holiday Site in Porthmadog and spending a couple of weeks in the area, tootling around in Erica. On this hill, with its lower reaches covered in dead bracken, I appreciated again that circumstances had me in the area in December, rather than in peak growing season.

With my approach to this one being on the sunny side of the hill, and with it now approaching the middle of the day, I was finally warm. Too warm, really, even though I'd shed my jumper before I started. 

After all of the people encountered yesterday, this was the first one today where I met anyone - a family of three with elderly mum struggling up the stone steps, but with adult children helping her along. I passed them again as I was on my way down and stopped for a brief chat with daughter whilst son continued the '1 - 2 - 3 - up you come' efforts on the continuing steps. Their progress was slow but they were in good spirits and I have confidence that she made it to the top. 

  

Sea behind me in that direction...

...and sea behind me in this direction too.

Garn Boduan (SH 312 393; 280m)

Start Point: car park on E side of Nefyn at SH 308 404.

Distance and Ascent: 3.5km, 240m

 

By the time we were on our approach to this hill, it felt like we had driven every tiny lane on the peninsula, which is perhaps why I decided it wasn't worth the 3 mile driving detour to the S side of the hill to facilitate a linear route, from S to N. 

The downside of the northside, made worse by it being through trees, was that the heat of the sun on the previous hill was now but a distant memory. The ground was hoary white and I suspect it hadn't thawed for several days. 

It was another fine viewpoint of a summit, and I visited it twice, having managed to convinced myself not many metres into the descent that I was dropping off the hill the wrong way. I finally worked out that the line I'd drawn on the map was not the route the path actually takes and thus I had been going the right way.  

People were apparently out in force on this hill, in that I kept hearing voices, but with a variety of paths, I met noone on my way up and only two groups on the way down. The second was a family group and one of them commented that I looked like I was on a mission, and they were quite right. I only had five hills on the agenda for today, but had realised that if I got down from this one reasonably promptly, I could fit a sixth in. 

Chilly ascent!
 

The second pimple from the left would be my final hill of the day

 Yr Eifl (SH 365 447; 560m)

Start Point: large car park to the SW

Distance and ascent: 3.6km, 290m

 

Rather unusually, this was a hill that Mick had previously been up, but I hadn't. Whilst I was walking the Coast Path in 2014, he was sitting in the car park waiting for me, it was a nice day and there was a hill right there -->, so he nipped up it. I recalled him having done that, and my contemporaneous blog confirms it, but he had no recollection of it until I showed him a photo of the summit when I got down.

I'd like to claim that it was intentional, after a day of fundamentally out-and-back routes, that I did a circuit on this one, but the reality is that I just chose the wrong path soon after leaving the car park and thus found myself on an increasingly narrow trod through heather. Moreover, it felt like it was taking me past the hill, and although I kept patiently waiting for it to turn up the slope, I eventually gave in and just cut up over some boulders. A few moments later I saw a couple striding down the path a few metres to my left. Of course, now that I see my line on the map, it looks perfectly sensible.

I took the tourist path down, and found it steep and eroded, so maybe there wasn't much to choose between the two routes after all.  

Even though the day's cumulative distance and ascent wasn't that big, I was certainly ready to stop once I got back to the car park - which is a good thing, as it was now approaching 3.30pm and the sun wasn't too far above the horizon. 

I could be wrong, but I think that 6 may be the most Marilyns I've ticked off in a day before. I certainly remember some 5-hill days, but nothing above that springs to mind. 

The distinctive trig-point topper on Yr Eifl that jogged Mick's memory that he had indeed been up there.
 

 

 

 

 

 
 

Boxing Day - Moel y Dyniewyd & Moel y Gest

Weather: Cool, with quite a wind chill, but gloriously sunny.

Moel y Dyniewyd (SH 61269 47739; 382m) 

Start Point: Aberglaslyn National Trust Car Park (£4 per day)

Distance and Ascent: 6.4km, 425m

An early start and a long drive saw us arrive in the car park at Aberglaslyn at 1040, at which time it was about half empty. Fifteen minutes later it was full and we saw dozens of people out on the Cwm Bychan path (at one point I counted 22 within sight ahead of us). Curiously, once we turned off the main path towards our summit, we saw not a single person until we regained that path. (Once back in the car park, we looked at the information board and surmised that everyone else was doing a circuit via Cwm Bychan and Beddgelert, returning at low level along the river ... and as I type that I feel sure that I've done that route myself in the past, at least once).  

You may note that I said 'we', as Mick, having initially declined to join me, suddenly decided, as I was getting ready, that he would come along after all. Maybe he was swayed by the number of people around - if they all thought this was a good walk, he wouldn't want to miss out. 

It was a very pleasant walk too, with excellent clear views, most notably across to the snowy summit of Snowdon. 

Turning off the main path, a trodden line took us up the N side of a fenceline up to our summit. 

The going uphill had been easy enough. Mick found the descent a bit trickier with the rocky sections being harder in descent, particularly with the low sun hampering vision of where we were putting our feet. 

Many more people were greeted on our way back down to the car park, where we arrived just a little over two hours after we'd left. Thinking the next hill on the agenda for today could take a similar length of time, that left us with an hour to have some lunch and a cup of tea, and to drive there, if I was to get down in daylight (I should maybe clarify that we'd not set out promptly when we arrived in the car park at 1040; somehow we faffed for the best part of 40 minutes).

 

Lots of people ahead, but why wouldn't you be out on a Boxing Day like this? 

A snowy Snowdon

  I think we look superimposed on this snap, but we really were there!

Moel y Gest (SH 54927 38894; 263m)

Distance and ascent: 3.7km, 250m

 

I didn't ask if Mick wanted to join me on this one, but assuming that he didn't, I asked him to drop me at the track end, to save me 400m along the road from the nearest layby, thus increasing my chances of getting back without needing a headtorch. 

I'd noted two possible ways up this hill, being confident that the longer option (skirting to the S of the hill) would be fine, but being less confident about the shorter option, using a path shown on Open Source Mapping, but that wasn't readily visible on aerial photos. As evidenced by my recorded line, shown in the map snippet above, the shorter option worked just fine.

I hopped over the first gate (padlocked) on the left after the start of the access land, followed a grassy track up for a short distance, before then cutting the ensuing switchbacks by taking a faint trod up the hill. A combination of trods and ATV lines then took me all the way to the top, where I encountered eight people. 

The wind was now much gustier than it had been on the first summit of the day (and the chill even chillier), so care was taken as I stood atop the summit rock, then on another nearby rock that looked like it might be a similar height. 

With steps retraced, plus the extra little bit along the pavement to the layby, I was back within an hour of setting off - a much easier outing than expected. 

 

Easy walking to a rocky summit 

The hood was to keep the hat from blowing away.

 

Monday 17 November - Rhialgwm & Allt y Main

Weather: Gloriously sunny morning with just a few clouds bubbling around later.

Rhialgwm (SJ 055 211; 540m)

Start Point: layby by Ty Cerrig on B4396

Distance and ascent: 7.4km, 290m

If I'd looked at the 1:25k map on the hill, or the notes I'd made in advance, I would have known that the old track did, in fact, go almost to the summit, if I'd just taken more trouble to keep myself on it. 

There's a minor road off the B4396 that would have got me nearer to this hill, but my journey up there on StreetView had told me that we wouldn't be driving it. It's narrow, hemmed in by hedges, doesn't have passing places, and I'd read that the road surface degrades significantly after the house that's up there. Erica doesn't like rutted roads (she hangs low, with her wheelchair-accessible lowered floor), and it was no hardship to walk the extra distance from the B road.

Beyond the minor road was a byway, and it put me in mind of routes I've run and walked in France. That lasted until I got out of the trees and was faced with a field covered in dead (but not yet entirely flattened) bracken. A series of trods took me up through most of it, to a relatively newly replaced barbed-wire fence. A trodden line immediately next to the fence, via a couple of rotting sheep, took me to another fence, but that one I was able to step over (I had to go slightly uphill to where a rock effectively made the fence lower - pity I left my poles down at the corner, as it was rather steep making my way back down the other side).

I then picked up an old grown-over (but still pretty obvious) track, but lost it where there was a tree growing in the middle of it and I went right around the tree, missing the fact that the track turned left at that point. The subsequent yomp through dead bracken, then heather, was harder going than I'd expected on this hill. 

The reward came at the top. What an excellent summit! Helped by the weather, the views were extensive in every direction. It had been worth the effort. 

I more or less retraced my steps for the return, managing to walk more of the old track on the way back.  

A quick lunch back in Erica, and off to my final hill of the trip.

(Looks like we're going with photos out of order again today) 

Up the bridleway

Summit selfie

The friendly heather, with a line through it, and my first view of the trig point.

This would have been somewhere between the stuff of nightmares and impossible in peak bracken season (although in fairness, I was trespassing here, as the right of way through the forest is blocked by most of the trees having snapped in half during some storm). 
 

Allt y Main (SJ 162 151; 356m)

Start Point: end of minor road, SW of summit

End Point: Layby on A495, SE of summit

Distance and Ascent: 4.5km, 190m 

 

I would strongly advise against my route of dropping straight down the hillside from the summit. 

Mick dropped me at the end of the minor road to the SW of the hill, where I know that other people have parked. However, the only off-road space there, is through a gate just beyond the road end, and it's just off a track that leads to a house. Neither of us felt convinced that it was somewhere we should be parking, so rather than waiting there, Mick drove around to the layby I had originally intended to be my starting point (before laziness caused me to go for the route of least ascent). 

There's a track, then a path, that leads the whole way to the summit and with less than 200m to be gained over the course of 2.5km, it's an easy walk. Unusually for a hill in the UK, there's even a bench up there, and it's a fine place for a seat, being an excellent viewpoint. 

Having admired the views, I then took a rush of blood to my head and decided that instead of following the entirely sensible, but indirect route, of retracing my steps, I would just drop down the side of the hill, back to the track that I could clearly see below me. That was a mistake. Or to put it more precisely, that was a MISTAKE! Will I ever learn? 

It was fine for the first section, until I hit a big tangle of brambles, with two options: climb steeply back up, or bash through them. I bashed through (my Paramo trousers protected me from scratches). It was slow and awful. To make matters worse, I got to within a linear pace of the track, to realise that I was a vertically above it, with no way of getting down. Another big patch of brambles lay on my escape line. By the time I got back onto the track, it was clear that the long way around would have been quicker, easier and far more sensible*. 

The rest of the way was plain sailing, even if there was a period of great confusion in conversation with Mick when I found that my intended path didn't exist and thus I was going to come out further up the road than expected. We weren't helped by Mick looking at the wrong map, and thus not being able to fathom which path I was talking about. All was resolved when, to my great surprise, I came out exactly where Mick was parked. It turned out that the fault was my misinterpretation, at the planning stage, of where the layby I could see on a StreetView lay on the 1:50k map. 

So, five days and twelve more summits collected. A good time has been had, and thanks go to Mick for ferrying me around.

(*I've just checked the stats to see if my short cut really was slower, or if it just felt slow. Going back the way I'd come on the tracks would have been 1.5km which even at a walk would have taken me 15 minutes. I probably would have run some or all of it so it would have likely taken me 11 minutes. My ill-advised descent route took me 12 minutes.) 

As I now look at the view behind me in this snap, I realise that the notable hill over yonder is the one I'd been up earlier. 

 

At the risk of expressing a controversial view, I think that more summits in the UK (and more paths) would benefit from having benches installed.  

 

 

 

 

 

16 November - Tarrenhendre & Tarren y Gesail

Tarrenhendre (SH 682 041; 634m) & Tarren y Gesail (SH 710 059; 667m)

Start Point: where the track to 'Quarry Siding Halt' leaves the B4405 (no parking - I was dropped off)

End Point: Abergynolwyn 

Distance and Ascent: 16.2km, 930m 

Weather: Overcast but dry. Disappointing, against a forecast of wall-to-wall sunshine. 10 degrees in the valley.

 

Had I been by myself, I would have done this as a circuit from Abergynolwyn, going through the forest from Abergynolwyn Station. My other plotted route was from where I did actually start, but taking the more direct route using the track that ends W of the summit. In the event I decided I fancied the option that was a little further, but gentler and on a good track all the way to the ridge path. 

If I'd visited these hills yesterday (when the views would have been so much better), I might have been thwarted on my chosen route by two fords that were still swollen, with evidence that the streams had flooded very recently. As it was, I was able to cross a few paces upstream (I would say 'without getting my shoes wet', except the grass alongside was waterlogged in both cases).

 

Reaching a cairn on Tarrenhendre, I snapped my usual summit selfie, took a snap of the view (which turned out to be one of the clearest of the day, before the murk descended again), and sent a message to Mick telling him I was at the top. Fortunately, I then noticed that I had two waypoints marked on my map and thus came to realise that where I was standing was not the top - it was a spurious waypoint. Glad I noticed that when I did! 

 

With the actual top duly visited, onwards to my next objective, via a rather pleasing walk along the ridge (albeit there was a bit where I went around a small lump rather than over it). 

 

At the final dip before heading up Tarren y Gesail, I was surprised to see a newly laid track, terminating at a turning circle, off the end of which was a newly laid footpath. That wasn't marked on my map, but I had a good phone signal, so I paused to look at aerial maps to work out where it went. Up my hill was the answer, albeit it looked to take a rather indirect zig-zagging route. Given that I was 180m below the summit, and less than 1km away, I decided to stick to Plan A, which was to go straight up the fenceline. 

 

It turned out that: a) the path was newly surfaced at the bottom, rather than being a new installation  - further up it looked like it had been there for some time; and b) it zig-zagged to almost touch the fenceline so I could have hopped onto it at various points; and c) straight up the fence was the right choice for me - as much as I'd enjoyed the easier but less-direct route up my first hill, this path did seem to have taken the zig-zags to the extreme when it wasn't that steep (and not at all eroded) going straight up. 

 

This is one of those 'find the patch of ground that's maybe an inch higher than all the other ground nearby' jobs, so I did the best I could with finding the unmarked highpoint, before continuing on to the trig point (which has seen better days).

 

The first bit of the descent was soggy indeed, before I got onto nice firm grass again. I then took a short cut that was quite possibly both harder and slower than my intended route, but having picked my way down the edge of a felled area of forest, then down a field of long grass hiding some boulders and holes, I made it to the footpath through a large area of quarry remains (buildings and slag heaps, not just a hole with a pond at the bottom). That footpath was both overgrown and running with water, making me slower than I would have liked (knowing that Mick was waiting for me once again in the local cafe); the track onto which it deposited me was even wetter still, overtopping my socks before I finally got onto solid ground. 

 

A gentle jog along the road saw me back to Abergynolwyn only a short while after Mick had been ejected from the cafe as they'd decided to close early (I asked whether it was the only way they could get rid of him, but he had been the only customer, so probably an economic decision). I apologised for my slowness, before looking at my watch and discovering that I'd only been 10 minutes longer than expected. 

 

Photos in a random order today: 

 

The trig on Tarren y Gesail

Upper Dolgoch Falls

One of the contenders for highest spot on Tarren y Gesail (I think the actual high point was a little further on)

Summit selfie on Tarrenhendre, after I realised my first summit selfie wasn't at the summit.

Oh, to have had the forecast blue sky to show off the views to their best advantage

The clearest view snap that I managed.

Taking the long route up Tarrenhendre - you can see how gentle the track ascends

Why does a gate which has a perfectly serviceable spung bolt, also need a chain with a clip? And why, if you feel that the sheep may have learnt to open a sprung bolt, do you apply a chain so short that it's really difficult to clip it back together when you're on the opposite side of the gate to the clip? Because I couldn't bring myself to leave the chain off, even though it's clearly not needed, I nearly climbed back over this gate to secure it as I struggled so much once I'd passed through. 

Another view shot.