Their story, in their words…
The morning of our trip didn’t start exactly as we planned, with the Victoria line being shut down we therefore had to take an alternate route to London Euston and ultimately, missed our train to Bangor.
Luckily the staff at Euston let us take a train to Crewe then changed at Chester and finally took a train to Bangor from there. After these extended train journeys, we took a 1-hour bus to our campsite, set up our tents and explored the campsite.
While the campsite was small it still had a range of facilities such as a Canadian canoe which we utilised and explored down the river which ran beside the site.
The next day we woke up early to catch the bus to take us to the base of Mount Snowdon. The weather started off clear at the base of the mountain, however as we got to around halfway through our hike the winds became very strong causing fog to roll down the mountain and it started to rain. This made the hike a lot more challenging.
Eventually we made it to the top of the mountain and couldn’t see anything from the top whilst fighting the strong winds and practically scrambling to the summit. On our way back down the mountain there weren’t too many other people.
This increased the probability of getting lost, so we ended up taking the safe option and decided to walk back using a different path with a small group of people. This route allowed us to go back to where we started our hike but had an easier and flatter path. This path had beautiful views of the mountains and lakes surrounding Mount Snowdon. We rewarded ourselves with a hot chocolate at a café whilst waiting for the bus back to our campsite.
The night after our hike up the mountain the weather conditions worsened as we caught the tail end of storm Lillian. As a result of this both our tents and kit got soaked.
The next morning, we decided it wasn’t worth it to stay in the tents and decided to book a hostel. Check in was at 4pm so we decided to just explore the area around us and walk along a footpath that had beautiful views of the countryside as well as its flora and fauna. Eventually after a long and tiring and eventful day we made it to the hostel and had dinner.
The next day we decided to explore the slate quarries near our campsite and walked around the area near our hostel. On the fourth and final day we left the hostel early and explored ironically a sunny Bangor before taking the train to Crewe and back to London Euston to conclude our trip.
The trip allowed us to climb a mountain and visit a country we have never been to before, whilst giving us the challenge of staying within our budget. This was such a unique experience that we thoroughly enjoyed.
