The continued summer conditions have made working in the great outdoors an absolute joy again this week! A bit of gorge walking, hiking and some expedition fun made for an action packed few days.

After our late night climb there was a bit of kit sorting back at The Cottage before anything else could be done. With climbing kit sorted, I got back out my camp kit to assess another Duke of Edinburgh’s expedition group.

It was so hot on Saturday, that I re-routed the group from the mountains to take a cooler journey down at sea level.

I also managed to find some cool checkpoints along the way.

Clare came out to help at the camp and we had the unusual conditions of absolutely no overnight dew, which made things a lot easier – and with the bonus of no tents to hang up to dry at the end!

We chanced out luck by having dinner at the beach on Sunday, but some stormy clouds beat us there! We had a fine feed, but without the sunset, it was a bit nippy for swimming.

Sunshine returned on Monday, which was great timing for Neil and friends who are visiting this week from Somerset.

A weather warning was issued for thunderstorms and hail, but we took a chance and managed to get up to Cwm Idwal before it developed.

After a hot lap of the lake, it was actually too hot at The Cottage Cafe to sit in the sun. We had some local cake and a cuppa, but soon switched to cold beers! Incredibly, less than a hour later, forked lightening, thunder and heavy rain poured down over The Cottage! Good timing!…