This weekend I headed up to the Brecon Beacons with the expedition society at my university for a weekend. It is always a really fun weekend as after the walk on the Saturday we have a Christmas dinner, this year we cooked for 40 people!
The weather on the Saturday was a superb winter day with mostly clear skies, sun and a sprinkling of snow on the higher slopes of the mountain. Pen Y Fan is a mountain I climb all the time due to it being under hour from home in Bristol, but I normally climb it from the other side so it was nice to do it a different way as we walked in a loop which started and finished at the Youth Hostel we were staying at. This meant we went up from the Storey Arms and then back down another ridge on the same side of the mountain, which also had the advantage that we were sheltered from the very strong and cold wind that we were hit when we joined the ridge which went up to the summit! Due to the great weather conditions the views from the top were great and due to it being winter there was no heat haze which was a large issue last time I climbed the mountain as despite it being crystal clear it was really hot which meant that due to haze the views were limited.
On the Sunday the weather was awful so rather than walking around a reservoir as planned in the pouring rain we visited Big Pit, a coal mine which has been opened to the public, on the way home, which was great though the conditions the miners had to work in was atrocious but it was interesting to hear the view of the person who showed us around the mine as while he said he doesn’t understand why they were shut, he is so glad they were as it means his children wouldn’t follow in his footsteps and have to work in those awful dangerous conditions!
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