Day 45 Llyn Du to Llyn Hywel

Monday: Up 07:36 away 11:30

Rain during the small hours but glorious when I got up. Tent was dry already and ground sheet was dry. Glad to learn I had suceeded in picking a dry spot.

Very lazy start because I was wearied from yesterday's long hike. Much shorter one today with 2 peaks as the objective and a short distance betwen them. A few hikers passed my pitch and stopped for a chat.

Once away my first obstacle was a tranverse of a bolder field along the north edge of Llyn Du (Black lake). It was then a simple job to follow the well worn path westwards to a wall then a left / SSW turn to follow the wall a few 100 yds up the hillside to a left / east turn onto a footpath. The OS map suggested to follow the wall further up the hillside to a left / east turn. An Australian couple I had met had done this. But they had had to return because they had been unable to find the left turn. I was following Dave Taylor's directions which were spot on.

At the top of Rhinog Fawr it was quite breezy so I didn't linger. The descent was straightforward, following Dave's directions and referencing the map which aligned. At the bottom there is a wall to cross. Options are crawl through a hole or climb over where the north end meets a cliff face. On my previous visits I have crawled through the hole but this time I climbed over. Fortunately without incident. When I first climbed Rhinog Fawr on my own on my first visit some years ago, I missed understood the need to cross this wall and ended up climbing over boulders and cliffs with the result I took hours to get to the summit.

Once at the bottom, at Bwlch Dwrs Ardudwy, I turned right / west. The path here spits a number of times. The higher path seemed generally the drier one. However, there was no avoiding the bog at the point where I had to turn left / south to a ladder stile at the bottom of Cwm Hosan. 77 minutes later, after a hard ascent, I reached Llyn Hywel (Hywel lake).

I pitched and while making supper met Lotta from Denmark who appeared to fill her water container from the ridge behind (west) of me. We had a pleasant chat surrounded by Midges which she said were not around her pitch. Note to self, if there is little breeze, perhaps avoid pitching lakeside.

As I was clearing up low clouds rolled in. Within a few minutes the lake was obscured, with visibility 30 yards. This put paid to my proposed attempt to ascend Rhinog Fach after supper.

Arrival and departure times from features visited today.
07:36 Woke up
11:30 left pitch
11:49 completed alongside Llyn Du rock scramble
13:20 Rhinog Fawr
14:45 Snack stop 15:00
15:40 Bwlch Arddawy
16:11 cross ladder stile at bottom of Cwm Hosan
16:27 Llyn Hosan
17:28 Llyn Hywel
19:00 Supper finished, mist began rolling in
19:18 everything squared away. Total white put across lake

3.4 miles and 1558ft of asent from Llyn Du to Llyn Hywel completed at end of 45th day of walking.
Total miles so far : 423
Miles in 2026 : 13
Weather : sunny morning, hazy later with on and of breeze, cooler later, white out mist from 19:00.
Number of people passed : 8
Objective tomorrow : Rhinog Fach, Y LLethr, Diffwys, BarmouthRead more