Crib Goch and Waterfall Swimming: Summer in Snowdonia.
Looking back on this summer, I am actually lucky enough to have two Snowdonia tales to tell, as I embarked on two very different trips there this year- one in summer, and one at the beginning of September. This is the story of my summer trip up Snowdon with my Dad and my brother.
I have to say that when I remember the sheer amount of people piling up Snowdon during the summer of 2020, I wonder how many other tales there are around the world, each one recounting an entirely different experience. It’s amazing to think how many people walk over the same mountain every year, and how different each one of their stories would be. As I’m sure many other people found, despite its (many) pitfalls, one thing that 2020 did do for me was push me to rediscover my love for the outdoors, and this trip was no exception, as it gave me the opportunity to go camping with my Dad and my brother Charlie, something that was such a huge part of my childhood, but that we hadn’t done in quite a few years. For that reason, this trip was very special to me.
We packed all of our things on Friday morning, and we set off to arrive at our campsite that evening. Once we arrived we put our tent up, at which point we remembered how ancient it was. It was quite literally falling apart- we were lucky that it was such a dry, sunny weekend, because otherwise we would have been waking up in puddles each morning. Once we had done that, we set off to a local pub for some tea! We decided that burgers would be an appropriately filling meal in preparation for the day ahead. On the way back to the campsite I caught a glimpse of the first incredible sight of the weekend (of which there were many, of course.) As we drove through the mountains back to the campsite, I asked Dad to stop so that I could get a photo of the valley in the evening light; such a perfect start to our weekend.
The next morning, we got our rucksacks ready and made some breakfast. The other two decided to make some bacon and egg sandwiches, whilst I opted for a slightly lighter breakfast of yoghurt and blueberries — a decision that I certainly would not have made if I had known that we were about to embark on a 10 hour long walk. I hadn’t climbed Snowdon since I was quite a lot younger, so I had forgotten quite how much energy it requires. At 8am, we set off towards Pen Y Pass: the place where the car park is situated at the bottom of Snowdon. Most of the main Snowdon hiking tracks begin here. This first stretch of our journey was a walk of such blissful morning tranquillity. The mountain sides were quiet and empty; the morning sunlight was dappled across the brooks and streams. Once we arrived at Pen Y Pass about an hour or so later, I had been lulled into a sense of serenity that, it turns out, wouldn’t quite reflect the tone of the rest of the day.
About 10 minutes or so into the official walk from Pen Y Pass, we passed a girl who was crying, and her boyfriend was trying to comfort her. Even by this point, I really could understand her stress; the path was becoming steeper and steeper, my calf muscles were burning and Snowdon itself was not even in sight yet. Perhaps her boyfriend had not quite prepared her for the climb on which she was about to embark. In fairness, I don’t think I was mentally prepared, either! The route we were taking involves a knife edge arête to the side of Snowdon itself, called Crib Goch. There are a few different paths that you can take up to Snowdon — The Miners Path and The Pyg Track, for example, are quite popular paths and remain pretty stable on foot all the way. Crib Goch, however, is a serious climb over a very thin ridge of rock and it certainly is not for those who are afraid of heights, or even just slightly squeamish. I had never done Crib Goch before that day, so I had no idea what I was in for!
Eventually, we began a climb up a vertical edge of rock. I assumed that this was Crib Goch itself, as my Dad had told me that it was a very serious climb, and this seemed to fit the bill! I didn’t mind it too much, because climbing up isn’t too scary, and I had done a bit of free climbing before. This climb lasted for a while, but once we reached the top of the ridge, I realised that what we had just climbed was in fact not Crib Goch at all, but rather merely the ascent towards it.
I stood at the beginning of the ridge, and watched it stretch far into the distance ahead, and I made the mistake of looking down either side of me. To both my left and my right were sheer 300 foot vertical drops, and I realised that I was stood on a ridge that was only a few feet wide. The only way to get off was to climb across the whole thing. At this point, I have to admit, I was quite distressed. My Dad and my brother were so helpful in guiding me along, and after about 2 hours of slowly crawling across the top (admittedly with a few tears) eventually we reached the end, and just had the task of climbing down the rock onto a footpath below. Just before we climbed down, my brother persuaded me to look across at the views from this height. They were absolutely incredible. In this moment I wondered if the whole ordeal had all been worth it, and then I looked back at the vertical descent I had yet to conquer and quickly changed my mind. Next time I do Snowdon, I think I will take one of the footpaths instead!
Please do not let this deter you from climbing Crib Goch. If you are planning on climbing up Snowdon, and you enjoy an excitingly perilous climb, then it is something I would one hundred percent recommend! So many people climb it every year. My Dad and Charlie absolutely loved it, and so did everyone else that we encountered along the way. As one very lovely (and clearly experienced) hiker reminded me: the rock itself is actually very stable, so as long as you are careful you will be perfectly safe! Just make sure that you are prepared for the severity of the climb, and that you take it at your own pace.
Once we reached the stable footpath below, thank goodness, my Dad gave me a hug and suggested that we stop and have some jelly babies, which improved my mood greatly. Jelly babies are a great hiking snack, we always take them on any mountain adventure! (you also can’t go wrong with some Kendall mint cake or some raw jelly cubes.)
As we approached the top of Snowdon, you’ll never guess who I saw… it was the same girl that I had seen crying at the beginning of the day! Her mood seemed to have shifted from the previous despair to a state of rage. I heard her boyfriend say “come on, I promise it’s only a few yards until the top!” and she turned to look at him with a look of utter fury. It was really quite amusing, though I’m sure that if he had got some jelly babies out of his bag, her frown would have instantly turned! I genuinely think I could write a whole article about snippets of conversations I have heard whilst hiking, it is so entertaining and intriguing to hear five second snapshots of people’s discussions. But perhaps that is for another day.
After a packed lunch on the summit of Snowdon, we headed back down, and this time we took the Watkin Path down the mountain. As we were clambering down the rocks, we suddenly heard a shrill shrieking in the distance. Initially, it didn’t seem too out of place. There were quite a few groups who had been excitably shouting into the vast space of the mountains, so it was not something of particular concern. But as we walked along the shrieking persevered, for about twenty minutes we could hear a strange crazed scream, which happened in short arbitrary outbursts, and we had no idea where it was coming from. At one point the sound appeared closer than ever, and my Dad suddenly looked up. There was a mountain goat stood above us on a rock, channelling a Lion King-esque regality as he stood at the rock’s edge and held his head out above us. About every 5–10 seconds, he let out a maddened, unprompted screech. Charlie theorized that the goat was screaming at all of the walkers to get off his mountain, and that all of his goat friends didn’t have the heart to tell him that the reason all of the humans were walking down off the mountain was in fact because he was stood on the mountain’s descent, and not because they were fearfully obeying his authoritative screeches. The goat reminded me of a particular scene in the most recent version of The Grinch, which I feel perfectly encapsulates his confident determination. I’m convinced the writers of that film must have climbed up Snowdon shortly before writing the script.
As we progressed further along, and the goat’s deranged serenading grew ever quieter, we started searching for some waterfalls that my Dad had heard about. Anyone who knows me will know that I am always up for a wild swim, particularly in this instance, where we had walked for about 7 hours in the blistering heat. So this was set to be the most exciting part of the day for me personally. As the ground levelled off, and we began to slip into the shade of the trees, we saw the start of a chain of waterfalls cascading down the hill’s edge.
Everything about this scene was so unbelievably enchanting; the trickling symphony of running water was dappled with sunlight, and the pools were perfectly clear. I have to say that it is one of the most charming swims I have ever done. We chose one particular pool to jump into, where you could see Snowdon directly above the little waterfall. There was still some considerable distance between us and the campsite, and the evening was drawing ever closer. So we agreed that we would only swim in one pool and then we would start heading back. Although, we decided to return to Snowdonia a few months later to dedicate a day to swimming in pools across the whole chain. Our second trip took place in September (for which there will be a second account on here, if you’re more interested in swimming than hiking.)
The balanced tranquillity from the beginning of the day had returned, and the waterfalls provided us with the motivation to complete the rest of our walk back to the campsite, where the real reward waited for us in the form of beers and fresh stone baked pizza (our campsite was an absolute dream, as they have a pizza oven, an outdoor bar and serve seriously good breakfasts in the morning, so it’s a bit more glamourous than our usual camping spots.) I wish I had a picture of us eating our pizzas, but by this point in the day my photographic ability had been eclipsed by the bliss of pizza by the lake while the evening gently faded in — so here’s a picture of the lake, instead.
