A big happy birthday goes out to our instructor Eric O'Brien
today! Thanks for spending your birthday with all of us, and leading us on such
an amazing trip instead of being with your family. Our plans had changed
slightly from what was on the itinerary for the past couple of days. We had
planned to hike to the top of Mount Snowdon on Saturday but due to poor weather
we switched our plans for Saturday and Sunday.
There were 11 students along with Eric who all hiked up to
the top of Mount Snowdon today. We left the hotel around 9:30am and got dropped
off at our starting point around 10:30am. After a final bathroom stop and a
group photo we set off on the trail just a little before 10:45am.
The first part of the trail was a fairly steep climb and
most of us went from being chilly when we started to sweating fairly quickly.
We couldn’t see the top of Mount Snowdon when we began the hike and most of the
mountain was covered by clouds but the weather was starting to clear up. The
trail on the way up was split into two large sections that involved mostly
climbing and then two shorter parts that were relatively clear and flat. Once
we were able to see the top of Mount Snowdon it gave us some extra incentive to
keep going. The views kept getting better and better as we climbed higher and
higher. After about 4 hours of hiking we finally reached the summit and words
can’t describe the views we had from the top. You could see for miles and miles
in every direction.
Since it was Eric’s birthday we surprised him with a small
cake and banners at the top of the mountain and we gave him a card that all of
the students had signed the night before.
After lots of pictures and some rest we headed back down the
mountain on a different trail. We made great time on the way back down and a
good portion of it was very flat and smooth which made it much easier than the
hike up.
A few things tied to sustainability that we saw while we
were hiking was that there were signs along the trails that asked you to keep
you trash with you in order to keep the mountain clean. At the top of the
mountain the small café/rest house had several different types of recycling
bins for glass and plastic and the bathrooms had low flush toilets. We could
also see wind turbines far away in the distance from the top of the mountain.
It seems like sustainability is always within view in Wales.
Chad Dentlinger- Senior
in Earth Science, Environmental Science
Meanwhile, the rest of the group (those that would’ve
complained the entire time climbing the mountain) toured the town and all of
its beautiful shops! We ate lunch at a café called Fortes and came to find out
that “lemonade” is not really lemonade here. It is actually Sierra Mist. It was
very disappointing receiving a Sierra Mist when you’re crazing an ice cold
lemonade. At almost every place we went to, someone stopped us and asked if we
were from America. Apparently Americans don’t normally stop in Llandudno for
vacation so those we run into get excited and want to know all about us (along
with making fun of our accents).
After visiting all of the cute boutiques in this town and
spending money I really shouldn’t have spent, we walked down to the beach and
obviously had to take multiple selfies with our selfie stick. The view behind
us was amazing! You can even see the sustainable wind turbines in the
background!
From there we took the hike up our own “mountain” to go down
a huge toboggan slide. We were all literally out of breath not even halfway up
the hill we had to climb. We were definitely thanking ourselves for not
choosing to climb Mount Snowden. Unfortunately, the slide ended up being closed
by the time we got up there so we decided to visit the local pub that was right
next to it to make our trek up the huge hill worth it. By the time we got back
to the hotel, the other group had gotten back and we were all able to tell
about our day! We are all having a good time and are pretty happy with our stay
in Wales so far!
Autum Brocka
Senior, Accounting: Finance
