Wales

Due to the ridiculous amount that people are charging for internet (1 euro for 10 mins of the Greek Islands!) I'm a wee bit behind on the blog. So bear with me and I'll try and fill you all in as best as possible.

Wales was beautiful. It was really the perfect way to start our trip. We headed to a little place called Betws-Y-Coed which is up in the North and is at the edge of Snowdonia National Park. It took us 3 train changes to get there from London but I love the trains so I didn't mind one bit. Our hostel was quite small and quaint and we shared a dorm with 2 English lads who were in the town for field work. Geologists. they were so lovely and considerate. Their mothers should be proud!

The main activity to do in Betws-Y-Coed is to walk. So that is eactly what we did. Armed with our walking shoes and waterproof jackets we picked up a booklet with walks around town from the tourist info centre and headed for a short 4 and a half mile stroll. This walk took us though some woods and along a beautiful clear reiver. It was so quiet in there, eventually we makde to Swallow Falls which were a bit disppointing but a good conversation with some fellow walkers made up for it.

Our mian objective for the trip was to climb Snowdon Mountain. This is the tallest mountain in Wales and England standing at 1085m. The Geologists in our room advised us to head to one particular spot as they knew one of the paths started there. So this is where we headed nice and early on the Sunday monring. Now what you need to know is that there are 6 paths up Snowdon with degrees of difficulty. Being the novis walkers we are we needed the easiest path. The one we went ot was no this. The sign at the start of the path stated "this is the most difficult of the walks, NOVICE WALKERS ARE NOT ADVISED TO CLIMB THIS" Eek! So luckily we had picked up a leaflet of the easiest walk and tour delight it started in the next town over. While waiting fo rhte bus, 2 men n a mini bus offered us a life (it was safe Mums and Dads, they were part of a charity climbing the mountains!) as they were headed that way. So eventually we started the walk. There was a defined, nicely sloping path, views were beautiful and things were great. It was about 2/3 up the mountain that it all started getting harder. The path was getting steeper and we were now up in the fog so it was quite cold. It also didnºt help that the last mountain we had climbed was last summer and we are extremly unfit! Towards the summit I think I was taking 20 steps then stopping, 2o steps then stopping. Just short of 3 hours we finally made it to the summit! HOORAY! And wah a spectacular view - fog and more go. You couldn't even see 2 feet in front of you! By now I was cold and sore so we went into the shelter for what was the best cup of hot chocolate I've ever had! What an achievment! Now we were faced with a tough decision - to walk 3 hours back down or catch the trin. After much umming and ahhing we decided on the train for 2 reasons; #1 we were stuffed and #2 the buses back to our hostel stopped around 4:30pm and I did't want to miss it. We slept very well that night and woke up surprisingly good the next day with no sore muscles!

The rest of our time here was spent doing other small walks around th etown. There are so many beautiful woodlands in this area it was amazing walking through them and their Gorges were lovely as well. The weather actaully held out for us and we only had one day of rain and even that wasn't so bad as it stopped and stared. Even got a couple of walks in!