Cwm-y-Glo circular walk

          My memories are getting fuzzy already, thank goodness for photos.

          The walk we had planned for our last visit to Snowdonia was from Llanberis to Cwm-y-Glo and back again.  If I remember rightly we set off from Llanberis High Street, up the road opposite Pete’s Eats, up and up, and up we went, a very steep start but we soon had our heads above the roof-tops and the climb became a little less steep.

          We walked on through Glyn Rhonwy, a now dis-used slate mine.  It amazed me how nature had been able to not only survive on the blasted surfaces but in more than just a few places was softening and reclaiming the man-made harsh landscape.

          Glyn Rhonwy is an area to look out for in the future, one narrow strip of tar-mac runs along the top part of the site as an access road to the various scattered houses.  A lot of the slate mine is fenced off for safety reasons but it’s still etched with public footpaths.  At one point there seemed to be some sort of building with a car-park under construction.  It would be interesting to see what has developed on another visit.

          As we followed the directions on our little paper leaflet, looking for clues as we passed the landmarks they mentioned I clicked away with the camera, unable to decide if the views were beautiful or bleak.

          Now, half way up a mountain in Snowdonia you would expect to see the odd sheep or two wouldn’t you ?

          But a bus stop ?

          Well, I thought it was a bus stop, Hubby wasn’t so sure but I’m not sure what else it would have been just sitting on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere.

          Climbing a little higher and looking over to your right you can see we’ve passed the end of Llyn Padyrn, on our way back we’ll be walking along the near side of the lake back to Llanberis.

          We’re almost at the highest part of our walk, a small plateau with a view in all directions.  Hubby said it would be a great place to pitch a tent.  Of course I climbed to the top for the camera to take in a panoramic view and the remains of a small campfire told me Hubby wasn’t the only one to think it was a good pitch.

          As is so often the case on our small island, no matter how far we go, or how high we climb, we’re very seldom really alone.  As we walked away from the plateau two joggers appeared from around the corner and stopped for a few stretches while they admired the view.

          I’ll leave the walk here for now, at the highest point, enjoy the view before the clouds roll too far in, set up camp on the plateau or simply follow the joggers back to civilisation.  The hard work is done and tomorrow it’s all down hill.

           More from before : a circular walk between “Llanberis” and “Cwm-y-Glow“.