Day Walks In Snowdonia
14th Sep 2012
Day Walks In Snowdonia
20 Circular Routes In North Wales
I was born and grew up in Snowdonia so know the area pretty well indeed. My folks were avid mountain people so we were out walking aplenty. I remember setting off one fine Friday evening with my brother and my Dad up Crib Goch to camp up high. My Mum got a phone call from mountain rescue who had been alerted to the fact that my parents’ car was parked at Pen Y Pass car park and there was an almighty storm raging. My dad was an instructor and had taken us up there to experience camping in a storm. It was ace.
A guide to day walks in Snowdonia then is pretty close to my heart. On the first day of the Olympics I took my lad up Tryfan, his first 3,000er. He raced up and down, loving the adventure of it. Half an hour into the walk he turned to me and said “Cool, look at the view Daddy”. I’m expecting to be using this guidebook a fair bit and may even challenge him to see if he can walk all twenty walks some time.
If you’ve ever used one of the excellent Mountain Bike guidebooks by Vertebrate then you will be familiar with the layout and format of this one. It’s virtually identical (and why shouldn’t it, when they are so universally accepted?). The contents page breaks down North Wales into 3 different sections: Northern, Central and Southern Snowdonia, with a pair of bonus scrambles thrown in for good measure. These are colour coded so that you can quickly flick through the book to find a certain area. There’s also a map of the area with the walks indicated to give you a general feel for what’s where. Personally I’d have preferred to see this inside the front cover or somewhere more prominent than where it is, about 12 pages in, but the most important thing is that it’s there and it gives you the information that you want and need. There are sections on navigation, GPS, weather, phone reception, mountain rescue, safety etc and there’s even a section on how to use the book. The most important bit of information in this latter section is that despite the fact that the book includes pretty good maps of the walks, there’s no substitute for a proper, decent scale map. As somebody who grew up in Wales and was educated partly in Welsh it’s pleasing to see a page listing some of the more common words in Welsh.
Of the walks themselves I have done many, and there are some I haven’t. All I can say is that there is some fine walking in Snowdonia and this book captures the best of it. The photos inspire and the descriptions are very good. The book is small enough to fit inside your pocket and light enough to go in a rucksack without bothering you.
It comprises 152 pages and costs £12.95