There was a fantastic sunrise this morning. Soft light on some big clouds, made for quite a hypnotic view and an ominous feel….

I was in Llandudno before the sun was up to meet the group of students that I was due to be taking up Tryfan.

We were checking kit and equipment as the sun made an appearance, and it could have been easy to think that we were in for a lovely day.

Before talking through the weather forecast, we talked about what ‘Red Sky in the Morning’ might mean, verses ‘Red Sky at Night’…. The weather forecast confirmed that the fine weather would be short lived and it was already raining by the time we set off up towards Cwm Idwal.

It really wasn’t a day to be doing anything in the mountains, but we decided to set off and ‘see how things go’. Everyone was pretty much wet through soon after setting out, but spirits were remarkably high given the early start and terrible weather.

We could just make out the south summit of Tryfan from the South Col, and perhaps we could have carried on? We put it to a vote and ended with a 50/50 split. As we stood discussing our options and the risk/benefit of continuing a huge gust of wind blew through scattering us about and making the decision for us!

We had a bite to eat, and made the proper mountaineers decision of what to do next – we shouldered our soaking packs and set off down to find a cafe to warm up and dry out in!

As we descended even the footpath was disappearing under water as water flowed down the mountainside.

A decent attempt, and we all returned to fight another day and with a story to tell! We sat briefly in pools of water in the cafe, then decided that hot showers and washing machines were going to be needed in improve comfort levels! Back at The Cottage later that night, we finally dug into one of Mother’s enormous Butternut Squashes that she’d given us on our last visit to The Fort. We’ve now got a good supply of soup, mash and even put some on the Pizzas we’d made.

However, it turns out that they can cause a reacting to bare skin that looks like a severe burn! My entire left hand alarmingly started peeling as if I’d just picked up the hot baking tray bare handed! On the plus side, the food was delicious!…