I got to the forest of Coed Y Brenin on Friday evening, and impressed myself by locating the dark bothy in the dark woods a mile or so from the road. A bothy, if you didn't know, is a basic uninhabited house, usually in a remote area, maintained for overnight use by anyone who can find it. If you join the Mountain Bothies Association, you get the grid references for loads of them, mostly in Scotland but with a few in Wales and Northern England.
The bothy at Penrhos Isaf was empty on my arrival, and I had the place to myself on Friday night. With candles lit around the house and a fire going in the stove, I felt at home pretty swiftly. After dinner and a beer, I retired to my sleeping bag and roll matt on the wooden floor upstairs. The people who joined me the next night were surprised that I'd had the nerve to spend the night there alone - but then at that point I hadn't heard of the ghost ...
In the morning I had a bit of an explore around the forest, which I think I also had to myself, and drove South to the foot of Cadair Idris, the Giant's Armchair. I'd wanted to climb this mountain for ages and the weather was fine if a little windy.
The Minffordd Path winds its way around into Cwm Cau, before climbing the ridge that leads up above Llyn Cau. I never actually made it to Pen y Gadair, the very top of Cadair Idris, but turned back at the top of Craig Cwm Amarch (summit pictured) in what had become a ferocious gale. Still, I had a good look around and I'll definitely be back.
I headed back to the bothy to find two vets, a steel-worker and a website designer esconced by the fire. A lot of the conversation, naturally, revolved around outdoor activities. My house-mates for the night were into mountain biking and kayaking: apparently both are about tapping into elemental forces to carve your route - like drawing with gravity. When two more guests arrived later that night, they opened a conversation with the question 'Walkers? Bikers? Paddlers?' Perhaps there are only three kinds of people.
I took advice from one of the guys who professed to be all of the above and headed out to the Rhinogs on Sunday under blue skies and cold air. Rhinog Fawr from the East looked much more impressive in reality than it did on the map, and I enjoyed the wild feel of the place on the walk-in through forest and then up what started out as pathless, boggy mountainside. I eventually found an unmapped track that sped up my progress to the summit, where I got pelted by sideways hail and more ridiculous winds.
I only saw two other people on the mountain all day. I spotted some wild mountain goats out on the hillside - apparently they're descended form domestic animals but now totally feral. I thought this moss was every bit as wild, and easier to photograph.
