The images that go with this bit can be found here

Tuesday 23 rd June.

We awoke, and started getting ready for another attempt at the world breakfast eating record. Lee-Anne was looking out of the window, when a guy coming out of our hotel into the car park caught her eye. He was dressed in sports gear, and seemed to be doing a warm up routine for exercise, but a very odd one. It seemed to consist mainly of walking backwards slowly, stretching his arms out to the side, doing some twists, walking forwards for a few yards, bending and touching his toes, then walking backwards again. He kept this up for a solid twenty minutes, and then went back inside. Cool, my kind of routine.

Ok, we filled up at breakfast, consuming a days and a half’s worth of calories.

I strolled across the road and phoned the guy off whom we were renting our next stopping place, which was in North Wales. He answered sounding half asleep, I started talking about arrangements, and I had to start all over again after five minutes.  “I’m sorry, I was asleep,” he explained. I agreed our arrival time with him, though by the way he was yawning I still don’t think he really understood much of what I said. We departed Oxford, Sean was a great help in this.

We broke up the trip north by stopping at Shrewsbury. I hadn’t visited the place for years, and had forgotten what  lovely, ancient, market town it is. We got a coffee, none of us needed to eat, and headed up the road. We passed the ugly sprawl which is Birmingham, god what a place!

Then the roads got more narrow, the hills turned to mountains, the scenery was awe inspiring, and we were in North Wales.

We arrived at Bron Aber too early to book into our digs, so drove on to nearby Dolgellau to stock up on food. We did  several laps of Dollgellau before summoning up the courage to ask directions to the nearest supermarket. The first set of directions we got were in Welsh, at least I think they were in Welsh. We eventually got to a supermarket, which, to my delight, stocked a goodly range of bottled beers, I bought lots. Lee-Anne stocked us up on sensible things like bread, milk and cheese.

We got back to Bron Aber, and found the place we were staying. This had once been an army camp, then a camp for the workers building the big hydro-electric scheme at Transfynnydd. When that was over, they knocked the whole place down, and built a hundred or so log cabins on the old foundations, and we had rented one.

The nice chap I’d spoken to on the phone, who by now was nearly awake, showed us to ours, it was perfect. It had views down over the Rhinog Hills, and was cosy and comfortable. We settled in for the night. Seeing as I was still feeling restless after driving, I took a walk up the local hillside to get some shots of the views.

I found myself on a hilltop over looking Trawnsfynydd, and as the sun was setting, the sky and the scenery were perfect. Even more perfect in my eyes was noticing that there was a boozer signposted within walking distance of our cabin .

As I approached the cabin, something scuttled away from our balcony. Curious, I sat outside for a while, then two grey squirrels came and ate scraps and seeds off the bird feeder in our tree, I took a few shots of them, they seemed quite fearless.

Wednesday 24 th.June.

We woke at 5.00 am, covered in mozzie bites. Little bastards had been feasting on us all night. Well, actually, mainly on Lee-Anne’s legs. Mozzie killer spray was added to the shopping list.

So then, seeing as we were already up, it made sense to have an early start as we had a big day planned. This was to be one of my (many) holiday treats, one I had been looking forward to for some time, we were going to climb Snowdon, the highest mountain in England and Wales.

We set Sean to get us from Bron Aber to Llanberis, he decided to take us on a tour of N. Wales’s most narrow lanes. By the time we got to Llanberis we were jagged from the drive, and so decided to have a cuppa before hitting the peak. Unfortunately, this proved impossible, as at this time of the day Llanberis was shut.

So we drove from Llanberis to Pen-Y–Pass, to start our epic climb. This is one of my favourite drives in the UK, it winds its way up the pass, with brilliant mountain views and awe inspiring crags lining the route. Then, seeing as the car park there was full, we drove back down the hill to Nant Peris and took an open top double-decker bus back to Pen-Y-Pass. The view from the top of the bus was even more magnificent. We could see climbers starting up the left hand wall of Dinas Cromlech, the crag on which “Cenotaph Corner,” probably the most famous rock climb in the UK, is situated. Lee-Anne and Bethy were duly bored to tears by my raving about it.

Eventually we got to the start. We (I) decided to do it up the Pyg track, and to come back down the Miner’s track, which is the way me and Kingman traditionally did it each Xmas.

We set off, it was a scorching day, with 100% blue sky, I’d never been up here in such good weather. We had, fortunately, stocked up on water, and boy did we need it. We trekked on at a goodly pace, overtaking the usual numpties who had set off in sandals, trainers, jeans, skirts,  nice woolly jumpers, handbags, and other useless clothing/footwear items. How dim do you have to be to  think it was  suitable to wear clothes for a stroll to the shops, rather than suitable to climb the biggest lump in England and  Wales.

Despite our setting a very goodly pace we were overtaken a few times, once by an old bird, she must have been in her 60’s who jogged past us, wearing shorts and a running vest, with a terrier at her heels, pretty impressive I must admit.

I stopped every five yards to take photos, as I do. At one point I was taking a picture of Lee-Anne and Bethy, when a guy said; “Shall I take one of all three of you?” Very kind of him to offer, so I set up the camera for him, and he fired off a couple of shots, they turned out quite nice too. I took the camera off him, and he started to walk off. Then, spectacularly, he trips up, does a near complete somersault and lands on his face on the path. I was ever so concerned, he could have still been holding my camera when he did that. We picked him up and dusted him down, and left him to catch his breath.

There quarters of the way up our need to get to the top became quite pressing, Lee-Anne was dying for a crap, and there wasn’t any cover anywhere. We pressed on. We kept meeting up with groups of firemen, either making their way up or down, they were doing the “3 Peaks” challenge for charity, an event I must surely try to avoid.

We got to the top without Lee-Anne embarrassing herself, and her and Bethy vanished into the loos for an age. The new café block at the top of Snowdon is much better than the old one, but still an eyesore and a monstrosity. Though as Jim Perrin would have it Snowdon has become a sacrificial mountain, which honeypots all the tourists, and takes the pressure off the rest of Snowdonia. The top as ever was swarming with people who had climbed up, or had taken the train to the top and were now wondering what to do with themselves.

There were a few dogs at the top, which amazed Lee-Anne as dogs are not allowed in national parks in Aus, but here they were all over the place.

We took a couple of shots of each other, Lee-Anne and Bethy found a place in the lee of the biting wind which was blowing, so that I could go and take a few hundred photos of the views. It was so clear I could have seen Ireland, if I’d known what direction it was in.

Lee-Anne grabbed a small piece of summit stone, (which is now proudly on display at home,) and we made our way back down. The journey down was enlivened by a couple of rescue helicopters circling and landing and taking off again, they made a hell of a din in the amphitheatre of Glaslyn Cwm.

Down by the waters edge in the cwm, several troops of kids were setting up camp, what a brilliant place to have a camp out. They were most probably just setting up an all night rave or something, but hell that would have been great too.

The miners track seemed endless, and we were all flagging, when we rounded a corner and came across some ruined copper mine buildings, and I pronounced; “Not far now, the car park is just around that bend by the damn down there.” I wasn’t right of course, and we had a bugger of a long walk following that pronouncement, but I said it with confidence at least. Eventually we got to the car park, just in time to miss the bus, and waited for the next one. This wasn’t too much longer and we got great seats on the open top.

Grabbing the car, we hit the, now open, seething metropolis of Llanberis, and I took the girls to “Pete’s eats”. I wanted to take them there as Pete’s is a Llanberis tradition, no climber worth his salt would not visit Pete’s if in N Wales. It’s especially good value as it sells pint mugs of tea, and the biggest chip butties on earth. Lee-Anne and Bethy were duly impressed with both these menu items, , and I got to buy a pint mug to be my salvation for the rest of the trip. (This is also now at home in Aus.)

We also stopped off at the local Spar shop to buy an arsenal of fly killer sprays.

We drove back well satisfied with our efforts of the day. On reaching our cabin we nuked it with fly spray, then decided to eat out.

We took a stroll, slowly, to the local pub, the Rhiw Coch. This turned out to be a very old (circa 1610) manor house and home at one time to a local saint. It smelled a bit musty inside, like a lot of ancient houses do, and it reminded me of the smell of the old manor house I lived in at Tavistock. However, they had a goodly selection of real ales, amongst them a beer from my home town (Reverend James bitter,) so I was well pleased. More pleasing for Lee-Anne and Bethy was a great food menu. After a couple of pints we ordered grub, I ordered a starter and the desert cheese board, as I like this combination. Lee-Anne complained that I hadn’t ordered enough following our exertions of the day. The grub was good and plentiful, Lee-Anne couldn’t eat all of hers, despite the exertions of the day.

Thursday 25 th June

For some reason we slept in late, not awakening until 9.00 am, can’t think why?

Lee-Anne went to the phone box in the camp, and returned to let us know it wasn’t working; “Never mind we’ll find one local, there’s bound to be one in the area.” I optimistically pronounced. Due to the time difference between UK and Aus we only had a certain window not contact the Mother in law and Bethy’s dad, which unfortunately for us fell during peak charge hour for phoning.

We drove down the road, stopping at several phone boxes, none of which worked.

After filling up with petrol  in Transfynydd, we found a couple more, they didn’t work either, but at least they had some entertaining Welsh graffiti in them. Hint to North Wales Graffiti artists, it’s no good telling the English to “Fuck off home” in Welsh, they won’t understand you.

We drove on to the rather spectacular Harlech Castle. This is a very fine, well preserved castle, built originally in 1283 (we bought the guide.) You get almost unfettered access to all the castle, and the battlements are open for you to walk on. These are wonderful, they give views to Snowdon and the Irish sea, and you really feel the sense of history of the place strolling about on their tops. Actually I am surprised the H&S people allow this, as there are no guard rails, and the place isn’t plastered in warning signs and; “No Access” labels. (I bet the next time we go there there will be fully hermetically sealed glass walled walkways, and you’ll only be allowed to go up there after a risk assessment/health check/ wearing a safety helmet and harness and after taking out insurance. Mark my words, this is the way the country is going!!!)

Sated on history, we made our way into the lovely hamlet of Harlech, and found some more. This time at a café. This was the most amazingly well kept, fully art deco place. You really did expect Agatha Christie to stroll past with Hercule Poirot on her arm. (I know, use your imagination!) Bethy was entranced, she’s a big fan of Poiriot. It also had a quaint tea garden, and Lee-Anne was so surprise that dogs were allowed in the café, as they are in pubs.

Eventually we found a working payphone. Bethy had a chat with her dad about the castle, and Lee-Anne listened to her mother rambling on about how she was afraid we’d been mugged for the holiday money we had on us. (Lee-Anne admits her mother sounded like she’d had a few at this point.)

Our next port of call was Porthmeirion, if you’ve never heard of the place, click here. Absolutely incredible place, it really blew me away, the fact that we were there in blazing sunshine also helped give it an added air of an Italian Mediterranean village dropped in the middle of  North Wales. It now seems to be distancing itself from “The Prisoner” series, the main reason most people know of it. There was one shop selling prisoner souvenirs, but most of the stuff was crap so I didn’t bother. (I did buy the series on DVD when we got back though.)

Down at the seafront, a geeky guy was making his way across a stream, and through thick mud, with his poor bloody mother following him, to get onto the beach in order to have his photo taken in style of the famous “Rover” captures from the Prisoner. We watched him, it seemed a lot of effort, and his mother didn’t seem to be enjoying it much. He put so much into it, I didn’t have the heart to let him know he was on the wrong beach, the one he wanted was in the next cove.

After buying gifts at the Portmeirion pottery (seconds!) we drove onto Porth Madoc to get some shopping in, we didn’t stay long as it’s a complete shithole.

Back at the cabin we had the dilemma of opening the place up to cool it off, or suffering in the heat to keep the mozzies out, tough call.

I glanced up at the light, as it seemed a bit dark in there;

“Bethy, what is your skirt doing hanging from the light fitting?”

“It was an awesome shot, right?!?”

 

That night we ate at the Rhiw Coch again, I had a very good curry there, and some more pints of “Reverend James.” I had a good chat with the landlord, he had a good stock of single malts. He told me that he’d like to stock Welsh whisky, as there is a new distillery making a fine drop of the stuff, but it was too expensive to keep on the shelves. Bloody Nora, it’s cheap enough to get Llaphrohaig my favourite malt in, but not the home country version? Mad.

I must have had a couple too many pints of Rev, that night as, later on, I found myself back at the cabin, reading Saga magazines and enjoying them.

Time for bed I think.