We did it!

We did it!

Last Friday, 23rd of June, we hit our £1,000 target (we are now on £1,206!) which made us even more excited for our Snowdonia Climb the following day.

We left Southampton around half five on Saturday morning. For me early mornings is a real struggle and I’m grumpy in the morning until I have a coffee and properly wake up. So I wasn’t the most pleasant companion for the first hour or so.

I also get car sickness. I never used to but the last 5 years or so has been really bad and some times are worse than others-does anyone know how and why it developed at such a late age?-. So on most of our way there I felt nauseous and on the brink of throwing up several times. But as soon as I got out of the car and took a a few breaths of fresh, clean, unspoiled, unpolluted air, I felt much better  and couldn’t wait to commence our ascend.

We made it to Snowdonia National Park by 11am and 10 minutes later we were on our way to the top.

We took the Pyg Path which is not the easiest nor the hardest but it was a beautiful route. It was warm and an easy climb to begin with, with amazing views of the lakes and the mountains (loved all the sheep on the slopes around, how on earth to they climb that high?).

A LOT of people were climbing mount Snowdon on that day, apparently it was one of their busiest days, and I got the chance to meet lovely people. Some were doing the Three Peaks Challenge (one guy I met from Coventry was telling me all about his Himalayas adventure and the beauty of the Valley of Flowers), others, like us, were there to raise money for charity, I’ve seen families with young kids, people with their dogs. Everyone was friendly and with a smile on their face. It felt like a big family excursion, as if we were all climbing together. What a great feeling that was.

I loved the views, running on the side of cliffs, jumping into puddles, climbing on rocks, some of which were too high for people under 1.70m to get over without using their arms.

Towards the top it got cold, misty, windy and a lot steeper.  We couldn’t see anything, so we missed out on amazing views but it looked like a fairytale set on the Wall in Game of Thrones, if that makes any sense.

 

 

 

 

The top was VERY windy and frosty cold, very surreal!

After a short break we started our descent through the Lamberis path. That’s when I and I think most of the team started to struggle. It got very painful after an hour or so and I had to stop on a large rock to cut speed, my knees are still bruised.

We finally made it down-it took us around 7 hours to the top and back- and spent the night at a a lovely hotel (The Royal Ship Hotel) in the graphic, cute little village of  Dolgellau, which I definitely recommend if you happen to visit North Wales. The whole area around Snowdonia is just stunning with breathtaking mountain scenery.

We made it back to Southampton on Sunday afternoon, exhausted, bruised and aching but proud and happy. We now want to climb Ben Nevis next year!

It’s an experience I’ll never forget and I recommend it to everyone. PS when you are on your way up, don’t ask people how long it is to the top, every time we asked, nobody got it right!

Thank you to everyone who donated and all my lovely friends for their advice on what to take with. Thanks to you I had extra gloves and hats to lend to others, I had enough layers to keep me warm and avoided any nasty blisters although I wore a pair of brand new hiking boots that never worn before but they were awesome and very comfy, thank you Amazon Prime!

I’ve put together a little video of some photos and footage I filmed on the day. Is not the best quality as I used my phone but I think I did well considering this is the first time I produced a photo and video collage. And here it is  https://youtu.be/2F2B_5K-7CM

I’ll leave our fundraising page open for another week to give people who want to donate but haven’t done yet, a chance to do so.

https://www.gofundme.com/Snowdonia-Superstars-for-Tempo-Wellbeing

I can’t wait to hand over the money we raised to Tempo Wellbeing! What a great cause, definitely worth every single penny (check my last post for more on Tempo’s amazing work https://whatilearnedbeforeiturn30.com/2017/06/19/back-from-cyprus/)

I’m thinking of starting a weekly blog, so I’ll be posting again very soon.

Until next time!

Love you all

Eleni x