Weather Links

MWIS. Weather forecast for mountain regions. Only active Friday to Sunday. Highly Recommended.

Met Office. Now it's improved to a 5 day forecast! Great.

Snowdonia Snowline - States the altitude of lying snow in the Carneddau.

Metcheck weather

Advertise your Snowdonia Business here! Email for info.

Accuweather

Snowdon Weather Station Project. Weather data, but is down at the moment. The Webcams show Elidir Fawr and Moel Eilio.

Snowdon Sherpa Bus Timetables

Welsh Highland Railway.

Travelline Wales.

theTrainline - Timetables and online booking

The Welsh 3000s - website just about the 14 peaks.

The BMC - British Mountaineering Council.

The Mountain Bothy Association - yes, there are bothies in Eryri...

TAC - The Angry Corrie Scottish hillwalking fanzine, read it free.

Eryri - Snowdonia National Park.

Oggy Cam . Ogwen Mountain Rescue and a Ogwen Valley webcam.

BBC North West Wales.

Graham's Wales Photos. Loads of excellent pics on Eryri in here.

North Wales Photographs Beautiful photos of North Wales by Simon Kitchin.

Cambrian Mountains National Park A 'Should-Be' fourth welsh national park.

Snowdonia Society Charity which looks after the interests onf the National Park.

eryriway.org.uk Sister site to walkeryri, emphasising long distance trails.

Snowdon via PYG track.
Distance and Ascent 5.5km, 750m ascent OS Map Required OS Explorer 17 Landranger 150 Time 2-3 hours. Difficulties Zig Zags are an accident blackspot when iced. Start Location Pen y Pass End Location depends on descent chosen Grading Hard Facilities Cafe, parking WC. Public Transport Sherpa buses plentiful. GPS Files

Pen y Pass has some of the best routes up to Yr Wyddfa or Snowdon (but please, NEVER Mount Snowdon). There’s the challenging Snowdon Hoseshoe up Crib Goch and down y Lliwedd. Then there’s the easier Miners and PYG tracks. The PYG track is actually the easier of the two tracks, as the Miners Path starts off very easy before turning into a loose nightmare of scree above Glaslyn that can actually be a pain to navigate in mist. Then the PYG and Miner’s tracks join up for the remainder of the walk to the summit.

The PYG track (Either Pen Y Gwryd or Pig track, depending on your point of view) starts at a stile to the left of the cafe in the far corner of the car park. The best way to get here is on the Sherpa, it minimises car use in the park and there’s likely to be no spaces to park at Pen y Pass unless you arrive by 7am. Some choose to park along the road at Pen y Gwryd and walk up. I think this missess the point. It turns a central point of the park into an eyesore. Plan to park at Nant Peris or Nant Gwynant and get the Sherpa to Pen y Gwryd. You’ve then got the option to walk down a different way to get a Sherpa to your starting point.

The path is reasonably straightforward. It descends initially in big steps towards Bwlch y Moch before levelling out. Just make sure you don’t take the path to the right here, marked Crib Goch! You should get your first views from here of the summit, if you’re lucky. I’m yet to walk up this path without hill fog.

The path contours along the hillside below Crib Goch and above Llyn Llydaw and is a good path all the way, ust take care in the wet as the rock is well polished in places. It’s only once the Miner’s path joins that the path becomes rockier and often threads in different directions. I tend to keep right, the routes to the left tend to find scree.

Ascending slowly, the path eventually reaches the sheer cliffs below Garnedd Ugain before the wire gabions mark the point at which the path turns right up the infamous zig-zags. In fact, it’s just a zig and a zag and you’re on the crest of the ridge marked by a finger post, Bwlch Glas. If you’re descending, keep to the path. Taking short cuts acoss the zig and zags just causes erosion. In winter, this section is a notorious accident blackspot, so beware.

Take the path to your left, and the summit is close now, but still another 100m climb. The new ‘cafe’ is nearly finished, and there’s a set of wide steps up to the summit. It doesn’t feel very remote now, so take a quiet route down to make sure your day’s been worth it. Better still, if you’re confident of your fitness and hill skils, walk up in the late afternoon. This is the only time i’ll go up for pleasure these days. You’ll rarely see another sole/soul up there at that time, and usually get the summit to yourself. Of course, you’ll get the comments on the way up that you’re going up late. I just ust smile and tell them I’ve got a bed booked in the hotel!

General Links

Snowdonia attractions Several great reviews about some of Snowdonia's better known attractions. 

English-welsh dictionary Links and resources to help you translate that welsh word into English.

Walking shoes - Another site that I found that sells walking shoes online.

Merrell Walking Shoes from fitnessfootwear.com, decent little site i found for Merrell walking shoes.

Whalley Warm and Dry - paramo stockists, great service and range.

V-G Walking and Backpacking. Inspirational website detailing one to three (and more) day walks around the UK.

Trekking Britain. Route descriptions & experience as opposed to guide book.

OutdoorsMagic - Forum based website, lots of information on here.

Phil George - Mountain Leader Training in Llanberis.

Peak and Fell Walking - A photographic guide to walking in Britain's National Parks.

Wild Tramp.co.uk - New site on walking in the UK. Looks promising.

Tracklogs IMHO the best mapping for PC.

MemoryMap Still good, but route handling clumsier.

Viewranger mapping for smartphones.

Fugawi and Anquet are also popular.

Quo The new kid on the block.

Multimap - Free online mapping.

Get a Map - Free online mapping from the OS

Access Land in Wales - online mapping from CCW.