Climbing - Craig yr Ogof

We had a successful days climbing yesterday. Preparation didn't include taking a road map but the navigation system got us as far Llanllyfni (spelling correct) where upon we had to start using our intuition and bland directions to the car park. This process was complicated by the low cloud cover obscuring all the peaks.

This was the road trip

We had to fight our way past these predators on the 60 minute approach route.

One of two lakes below the mountain

Our first sight of the entire climb - it is the peak without cloud cover.

and a few minutes later

View from the base of the climb

Climbing finally - this is first belay position

Despite only starting the climb at mid-day we had a late lunch half way up on a grassy belay stance with beautifully exposed view of the lakes below and the sea in the distance.

Pitch 4 was a complicated by the fact that it was getting late, the wind had come up and I had pushed on past the recommended belay position. Running out of protection and rope I was forced to find a belay stance based on my remaining gear, largely slings and a pair of nuts. The howling wind made communication very difficult and Stephen often mistook the bleating sheep down below as me trying to say something. Thank goodness these were Welsh sheep otherwise they might well have bleated "off belay" or "climbing".

A full six hours and 135 metres later we made it to the top - a most enjoyable climb.

We got back to the car at 7:30pm. During the return trip we stopped off at an Indian and Bangladeshi restaurant that we had noticed 12 hours earlier on the trip. This pushed the estimated arrival time to 2:21AM and feeling really tired, despite stopping often for coffee, we finally gave in to sleep for a couple of hours and subsequently only arrived home at 5:30AM.

The rest of the days pictures are here

Craig yr Ogof