A few days rock climbing in Snowdonia when the weather perfect, ow yes please I here you say. North Wales is bloody brilliant when the weather is good and when it’s not, you can still go scrambling, mountain walking, exploring and with the right knowledge go to dry rock climbing that’s out of the mountains rain shadow or go to crag’s that stay dry in the rain. Knowledge of rock climbing in Snowdonia is key for this place. It took me about 4 years of constantly being there and going everywhere 22 times (well more like 3 or 4 times to most crags) before I got the hang of it.
So rock climbing in Snowdonia, it takes a while to learn the best places but I know them and I can show you. Let’s go……
I went up with a good friend Sarah-Jane to rock climb, to explore and for us to head to Cloggy on Snowdon. When it been dry for a while Cloggy is the place to head to as its takes a while to dry out and has an amazing selection of routes at VS and up. Cloggy – ladies and gentlemen is the place to be and we went up there mid week and so were plenty of other teams.
We started on the long route Great Bow Combination a HVS that is 180m long. The route is 3 stars and a top fifty in the rockfax new book, sold. A good route, not that hard for HVS but interesting and a good line. A fun route with long pitches and most VS leaders will be fine on it.
After we went and climbed the Corner, a Joe Brown HVS 5b and a beast at the grade. Make no mistake this is harder then Cenotaph corner and harder then any of the E2’s I had climbed on cloggy before. Either way, a great climb with bomber gear and a great way to start an even bigger adventure in the form of cycling the 3 peaks challenge……
That evening the second England game of the world cup was on and I went over to a good friends house to watch the game. After the game i went to the van to hit the hay and managed to take the end of my little toe off on the corner of a wall, it bleed everywhere. Nothing like starting 470 miles of cycling and 10,000 meters of height gain with a gammy foot…….
