Birthday Celebration with Snowdon

 Jon had a birthday, shout hurray!

(The primary birthday song just popped in my head.)

He turned 33 in early May.

The kids gave Jon a couple of boxes of protein bars that he likes.

 

 I found myself not really knowing what to give Jon. I think the best gifts are often ones which the person wouldn't necessarily think to ask for themselves, but is something that shows you know them and pay attention to them/their interests. This isn't always an easy thing for me to come up with though.

Anyhow, Jon loves the mountains and he loves to climb them. We have missed the mountains since we moved away from Utah. So to celebrate Jon this year, he and I left the kids with an overnight babysitter and drove to Wales to climb Mount Snowdon, the tallest mountain in Wales.

Wales, by the way, is very beautiful and it was really wonderful to see some mountains again. To any future visitors... I've determined driving to Wales would be a worthy adventure. ;)

We left our house at 7am and arrived at the mountain around noon. It was busy, with cars lining any available parking area and many people hiking an extra mile or so to reach the car park and trail head we were hoping to use and start at. Since that place was full, we found a different car park which offered a shuttle service to the trail head.

 

There are several routes/tracks to reach the top of Snowdon. We chose the Miner's Track.

I noticed as we were driving in Wales, several houses and buildings had butterflies on them. The gate at the beginning of the Miners Track also looks like a butterfly.

Snowdon's peak is the one in the middle.

There were a couple of ruins along the way, we assume from the mining that use to happen here.

The peak was up in the clouds. (Which makes it extra high, right?) 😉

The path started with gravel, and then came this large, stone path. I thought it was rather pretty.

Actually, the entire track up to the top is very well built and maintained. I imagine it costs a fortune to prepare it all.

We took a break at the top of a hill near a waterfall, where it started to rain and we put on our rain trousers and jackets. After we got going, we quickly learned that we were just shy of reaching another lake that was feeding the waterfall we had stopped by.

You may have to look closely to see the people zig-zagging up the mountain.

We didn't keep our rain clothes on long, as the rain didn't last and it quickly became too hot for them.

We accidentally got off our path and scrambled up a little waterfall area to another path. Later, we looked down at the path we should have followed and would have possibly been easier.

I'm not really sure what this is about, but there were two posts with coins pushed into wherever people could make them fit.

We were amazed by how many little children were climbing to the top of this mountain. (Good job to them and their parents!) Not all of those kids had the luxury of riding on their parent's backs, but several were doing the work themselves too.  You can also notice this trail was a busy one and produced queues a few times.

We made it to a ridge that felt like the top, but wasn't quite there. We were definitely in the clouds now and felt a cold wind.

If you don't feel like climbing up or down, there are a couple of trains available.

If you really wanted to make it to the top of Snowdon, a queue was required. It probably took us somewhere around 10-15 mins to wait our turn.

The line behind us.

Jon's so handsome.

We peaked it!

I'm not sure what they say, but you can see Welsh words.

I filled my bottle with some cold, Welsh mountain water.

The clouds were quite a bit lower coming down than when we saw this lake the first time.

We were nearing the end and I thought we should document our tiredness. Instead, this resulted with a very serious looking Jon, and me not able to make an extra tired face without laughing.

We finished and were ready to sit down for a ride back to our car.

We stayed at a lovely Bed and Breakfast, but arrived much earlier than anticipated, so we had to wait a little bit before we could be met and given our room.

Our room had a cute bay window with a beautiful view outside.

We enjoyed staying in a B&B and would love doing it more... though we don't think it would be the best choice when bringing the kids along.

We also visited this village:

The Church of Mary in the Hollow of the White Hazel Near the Fierce Whirlpool and the Church of Tysilio by the Red Cave

In other words, it's the longest village name in the UK, and I think the second longest in the world. Since it's in Welsh, we can't really say the name, but the above is the English translation. The sign that I'm in front of isn't even showing the full name!

This sign has it broken up, so maybe you can pronounce it correctly reading it.

Happy Birthday Jon!

You're the greatest!