But anyway, enough of that – not much time to stop and stare as we have a lot more mountains to go!  So it’s onwards towards Garnedd Ugain, peak number two, again with some interesting scramble sections, and then up to the famous Snowdon.  This is certainly the most interesting way to climb Snowdon, but perhaps not for those who suffer from vertigo!  We noticed how our confidence in scaling the pinnacles has increased as we complete this section of the route much quicker than we did the previous time.  A lot less clinging on for dear life and more confidence in our ability to pick a safe route.  However, we remain cautious as one trip and that would be the end of that!  As Ernest Shakleton said when he failed to reach the South Pole, “Better a live donkey than a dead lion”. (1874-1922)  And we plan to take this philosophy with us to Everest.

The Snowdon descent is probably my least favourite section.  We chose to follow the ridge over Llechog near the Clogwyn Station and make our way down to Nant Peris.  There is no clear path – that we could find anyway – and it’s steep, a tough one on the knees at such an early stage in the day.  Certainly this would be the place to use your walking poles had you not sent them back to the manufacturers a couple of weeks earlier for being faulty!   On reaching Nant Peris at around 8.30am we celebrated with a brief stop and enjoyed our first sandwich of the day and  some chocolate to get us up the next section.  There just wasn’t time to stop for any longer as we were aware that the Snowdon section was the quickest one and that the Glyder and Carneddau sections were likely to take much longer. 

But the weather conditions were much better than we had experienced during our training climbs, dry and most importantly with good visibility as it gets very difficult when the fog comes in and you can’t see a thing!  Even a mountain and route you know really well can look completely different and before long you can find yourself quite disoriented.  This can be dangerous and when completing something like the Welsh 3000’s time consuming. 

 The first mountain in the Glyder section is Elidir Fawr and Steve’s least favourite of the lot.  It seems a long way and was very boggy underfoot.  The scenery is less dramatic than that of the Snowdon section, but there is a kind of wilderness charm about it.  We have rarely encountered anyone else on this mountain and it seems to have it’s own weather system, but on this occasion we were lucky and even experienced a brief window of blue sky.  Our celebration on the summit consisted of a handful of Jelly Babies! 

 High on glucose we make our way around and up to Y Garn at a pretty decent pace.  Then it was down to Llyn Y Cwm and up Glyder Fawr.  It was at this point that we realised we needed to refuel.  Our legs felt quite heavy and tired and we had no fuel left.  However, we used our usual coping strategy of telling ourselves, ‘it will be worse on Everest’ and pushed on through the dramatic rock formations to the summit.  After a weary summit photo on mountain number 6 we took our only sit down break of the day and had another sandwich, some biscuits, some cake and a decent drink.  Heaven!  After about 20 minutes we were up and on our way again, feeling re-energised and motivated.  One thing we’ve noticed as we’ve got fitter is that our bodies recover quicker and that we can sustain a number of days of tough training in a row.  This will be important when it comes to Aconagua in December and then Everest in the Spring.

 Glyder Fach is one of our favourite mountains, although it can be quite time consuming which becomes frustrating when you are doing the Welsh 3000’s.  The summit involves a scramble over sections of large rocks which are treacherous when wet.  But the cloud gods were looking over us this time and there wasn’t a drop of rain in sight.  We even whizzed down the steep scree section without falling once – a first for us! – and then onwards and upwards to climb Tryfan.  This one holds good memories for us as it was the first mountain Steve has climbed and I dragged him up their on one of our first ‘dates’.  Hmm…not sure why he kept coming back really!  It’s also the mountain where few manage to find the same route up on more than one occasion.  This keeps it interesting and you can vary the difficulty of the climb to suit your ability and purpose.  As we were doing the Welsh 3000’s we took the easiest route for a change and were up in no time.  We enviously passed a couple of lads with a portable BBQ and sausages making a mental note to return next summer and do the same.  We made our descent of Tryfan and reached the bottom at approximately 3.30pm and that was the Glyder section completed.  Just the Carneddau to go.

We figured it would probably take us another 5 hours to do the Caerneddau section which finishes at the summit of Foel Fras. However, we realised it would take us a couple more hours to get back down to Abergwyngregyn to our car and we wanted to find the start of the very faint path down before it got too dark. So with no time to waste, we both consumed an energy gel and made our way up Pen Yr Ole Wen.  Steve is very much a convert of these gels but I’m not so sure!  The texture seems all wrong to me and they are so sweet! A nice tasty burger and chips would be so much nicer!  However, reminded myself I would have to get used to these and so got on with it without too much complaining!

Pen Yr Ole Wen is another mountain that seems to take an awful long time to get up and is very wet underfoot, sucking your feet in and making it that much harder.  As it was getting late in the day there didn’t seem to be anyone else going up and the sky had turned rather grey.  However, by this point we were determined that we would stick it out and make it to the end whatever happened.  So we slogged on to the summit of Pen Yr Ole Wen and then on to the summit of Carnedd Dafydd.  We stopped here for a few minutes to down some chocolate and coffee before we tackled summit number 11, Yr Elen.  This was the one I was worried about as during our training climb we had come up in a complete white out!  It was only when the cloud lifted for a brief 5 mines that we managed to include it! Again we were lucky and the weather held out until we made it there.  And from Yr Elen there really is an amazing view of the rest of the Carneddau as Yr Elen sits alone, looking back at the rest.  The only rubbish part about this is that you have to descend all the way down to climb all the way back up again, just to include little Yr Elen!  Steve also decided this was not enough adventure for the day and twisted his ankle!  Fortunately, it was nothing too serious and he was able to carry on.

The weather came in as we climbed back up to Carnedd Llewelyn and it turned dark and wet.  But we had come so far with such good conditions that this was not a major problem.  Whilst we were tired, on reaching the summit of Caernedd Llewelyn we knew we had conquered the hardest part of the Carneddau and that we had only 3 more mountains to cover.  And as if it knew we would not be defeated the bad weather retreated once again and the skies decided to give us a bit of light us we made our way to Foel Grach and then Garnedd Uchaf.  It was on these two that we experienced that beautiful light that comes just before sunset. Everything seemed so still, so quiet and at peace as the summits bathed in the last of the days light, the skies turning a hazy pink.  Just like the feeling of peace that we experienced at sunrise, we once again felt the same kind of peace, but this time in the knowledge that we were soon going to complete our mission.

And just as it was getting dark we reached peak 15, Foel-fras!  Summiitttttttt!  Welsh 3000’s in the bag, a great training day and a fun day out.  It took us 13 hours from the summit of Crib Goch to the summit of Foel-Fras.  Not a bad time considering we carried packs.  With  the initial climb up to Crib Goch and the walk down to Abergwyngregyn, our total journey time as about 16 hours.  A long, but very rewarding day in the beautiful Snowdonia.

Check out our photo’s on our Facebook pages – Patch Expedition