Category: Activity Groups 2017

Scaling Snowdon

Posted on | By Cstavri

Snowdon was a thrilling and exhilarating experience for every participant involved. The climb lasted for around two to three hours and our group took the long and adventurous walk up the monstrous mountain and involved scrambling, fossil finding and fool’s gold scavenging.

The group chose three members to rotate the roles of lead, back and navigator. The climb took a long time with several stops for food and drink as well as drinking from a stream half way up the mountain. The top of the mountain was cover by cloud and fog, making it hard to see further than a few metres ahead as well as being cold and rather wet.

The team worked hard together when trudging up the beast that was Snowdon, ensuring that no man or woman was left behind and from which we travelled together in a tight horde with the leader keeping at the pace of others. We partook in every activity explained or demonstrated to us and enjoyed every single second of the physical and social challenges that occurred.

We were told of several myths and legends of Kings and their involvement with the mammoth mountain. One story consisted of two kings ready to fight before suddenly they were disturbed by a giant living on the top of the mountain shouting at them and bashing them about before finally taking their beards for his own use, this led to the gang of kings living in UK to assemble and take on the ghastly giant himself before falling to the same fate as the first two kings, although there was one king missing, king Arthur. King Arthur approached the giant months later and stabbed him with a magical sword in which turned him to stone; creating the last section of Mt. Snowdon.

On our way down we trekked through grassland, ran along country roads and tramped past stone walls; stopping many times so that Jake could relieve his overfilled bladder. In total, Theo fell over at least 27 times and Tilly fell in about 6 holes in the marsh.

In conclusion, the trip was a fulfilling and memorable experience, the walk ran parallel with all the new challenges we have so far experienced, both social and physical, and led to a sluggish slumber down the mountain where we were collected by the KMC team looking back at the great beast that is Snowdon and waving in sorrow.

By: Daniel Banks, Theo Athinou

 

Climbing the highest mountain in Wales

Posted on | By Mr Taylor

Today we climbed the beast that was Snowdon but before we went we had a hearty breakfast of sausages, spaghetti and hash browns.
We were told to wear thick socks, long trousers and a thick jumper; spare gear was to be put in our backpacks.
The journey in the minibus only took 15 minutes but was fun as everyone started to sing ‘Fireworks’ at the top of their voices.
At the foot of the mountain Mary said we had two choices of route: easy and hard. She decided the easy route was the best for the group today so we started off on the Pyg Track.
A helicopter flew over and Elliot had a good shout hoping the pilot would hear. The walk was long but the scenes around us were breathtaking.
In the distance we saw both Mr Stavri and Mr Alderson’s group climbing up the hard trail; it looked cool and we hoped that they would turn around and see us.
After a while the cloud descended and we were walking inside of it! We heard the sounds of sheep, but could’t see anything at all.
We stopped for lunch at at Llechog and ate our sandwiches and cookies which were tasty!
When we finally reached the summit we were very tired but satisfied. We climbed the last set of stone steps and touched the highest point.
We had done it! We had climbed the highest mountain in Wales!

As we walked down we saw Elliot, Tom and Oscar crawling through a tunnel, making us all laugh.
The minibus back was a welcome break for our tired feet.

By: Ben Combe and Josh Relph

Gorge walking

Posted on | By Cstavri

We started the day by receiving instructions to pack a spare change of clothes, waterproof trousers and waterproof coat. Then we were commanded to put on a fleece and wellington boots plus a helmet, belt and a life jacket. Then we departed in the mini bus and took a 45 minute drive to the gorge.

When we got there we were asked to follow the instructor to the bottom of the gorge. It was slow progress through the gorge for some people. We were told to not pull some one up if they were lower than us as we might fall on top of them but we were allowed to pull people at the same height. The surrounding environment was like something out of a movie with the curvy trees and the beautiful flowing river with the falling autumn leaves. Then we followed Mike’s track to avoid getting wet. But one person while traversing lost his grip and flopped into the freezing water, falling in waist deep and screaming about how cold he was.

We did not stop for any food whilst climbing the gorge as there was simply not enough time, although we did have a snack before we went up and half way through the journey.

The gorge had over 7 thousand people visit last year, we also learned that it was created in the ice age; when the ice melted the water would move and spin rocks creating a path.

Later, a few of us jumped off a tall rock into water, we had to judge the jump properly as close to our right were some underwater rocks. We also went into freezing water; it was so cold that we could barely move our fingers. Then there was the water slide, made by nature, with a strong enough current to propel us down a couple meters. A wellington boot was lost when Jake jumped into the water; the rest of us had shoes filled with freezing water.

It was a rather fun day overall and one we will remember

By:  Kuba and Jake

 

Mountain Tryfan

Posted on | By Cstavri

Today we ventured up Tryfan, it wasn’t the biggest mountain we have been up but it was very frightening because of the sheer drops and rocky surfaces. Before we even started climbing Todd felt ill so we took the beginning slow. As we were half way up the first summit, we looked back to check on Todd and Mr Alderson, we saw Todd’s legs flip up to see him lying on the floor but he recovered quickly. We reached a point where it was necessary to use our hands and we started scrambling upwards with a few stumbles along the way.

After being deceived multiple times that we had reached the top, we stopped for lunch and regained our energy. Along the way we learnt to use the term ‘below’ if there were to be a loose rock to fall on the climber below. There were some challenging paths that we took to push ourselves like the big boulders with very few hand and foot holds, during these events we slowed down and were more cautious with our surroundings, we also had to check that the person behind us was ok so we could continue our route.

When we had finally reached the top, we were relieved, so we sat down by the Adam and Eve rocks and had a rest.

Just as we were on our way down, Ollie decided to follow Mason (not a good idea) and take a new route, as he thought he took the best shortcut… he stacked down a steep piece of rock resulting in laughter around the group and a few small bruises.

Everyone had a few stumbles on the descent but Harvey decided to have a little tumble himself! When we came out of the rocky area and onto the uneven stone pathway downhill Harvey decided to jump off one of the rocks not knowing, that in a few seconds, he would be running down the hill uncontrollably, he managed to stop himself by falling to the ground.

As the tiny minibus came into view, we came across muddy pathways, it started to become slippery and the squelching became frequent. As Mason was complaining about having to climb the next day too, he slipped on the mud and fell on his back, not causing himself any pain physically, but more upset about ruining his jumper! Mason seemed to do this frequently, but every time he managed to return to his feet we noticed that his joggers were gradually falling down! Luckily we had finished scampering down the mountain and his pride was to remain intact!

On the way home everyone was filled with exhaustion and most snoozed all the way back to KMC.

By: Izzy brown and Lucy Hickmott

 

Hailstones – Afon Ddu gorge

Posted on | By Mr Taylor

Today we went gorge walking. Gorge walking is when you go climbing, walking and swimming in a river.

In the morning Miss said we had to bring wellington boots, a KMC jacket, KMC waterproof jacket, waterproof pants and a spare change of clothes. We knew this was going to be thrilling! Now we loaded helmets, harnesses and life jackets. It took 45 minutes to drive there in a minivan. On the way we stopped for a toilet break.

We walked up a hill, to get to the river, but as we got in the river, we noticed that a little bit up, there were two groups ahead of us, taking a long time, so wisely Miss said to go around them. Then we walked up a little dirt track to half way up the river. Then we proceeded to climb up the river. We noticed the coldness of the water, as soon as we got it the deeper water. You can feel the water rush down your leg and in to your boots.

We came to a waterfall! As soon as we came to a deep enough pool, Oscar dived in… when Miss said not to! The rocks were very slippery due to the water, and many people slipped over [Erin]. The walk made us very tired and very thirsty, luckily there was some fresh water falling from a rock; it was the purest water I have ever tasted in my life

Now we have come to a wall which we had to climb; we climbed in pairs of two with a harness and rope. Miss climbed up a slippery cliff to tie the rope to a tree; this was so that we could connect our harnesses to the rope and climb up in pairs; it was quite challenging because the people at the top kept pulling us up when we were trying to get grip.

Finally we got to the top. After helping everyone up we got to one of the best parts of the trip. There was a pool which we were allowed to jump in. When jumping in, they made us wear a harness.  We wore a harness because when we jumped in, it was hard to get out, so they pulled us out with the harness It was the weirdest feeling, jumping into that pool; it felt like we were being swallowed, but our life jacket sucked us back up to the top.

We then came to a little pool with a trickle running into it. We used this as a slide. To make the slide better we got people to block up the river so when we were about to go, they stood up and a massive wave came and pulled us down the rocks into the pool. We arrived at a rock with a hole in. We had to go through it; it was very tight in that hole. At the bottom was the water that we had to sit in to get out. It was NOT for the claustrophobic!

Getting changed was awkward. We went into the forest, striped down, then dried with a towel and got into our dry clothes.

By Issac and Klark.

 

 

 

Sea Level Traversing

Posted on | By Cstavri

Today we went to a beach with a new instructor called Jez. We travelled 45 minutes by mini-bus. We drove through the village which has the longest name in Europe and has 58 letters. It is called… llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch.

The beach we went to was called Cable Bay. This was because it was the first transatlantic communication cable from Britain to America. This meant that one transatlantic country could tele-communicate with another for the first time. Another fact that Jez informed us about, was that we were the closest you can get to the Gulf Stream from North Wales. This means that leatherback turtles travel from America to north Wales to eat and hunt jellyfish. They then return back to America to breed. The largest turtle (3 metres 9 feet) recorded, was found in September 1988, 4 miles from where we were traversing. It was found dead because the jellyfish were confused for plastic bags which ended up lining the turtle’s stomach. This meant that Wales was the first country to introduce payment of plastic bags and encouragement for recyclable materials to be used.

It’s safe to say that Jez is a knowledgeable instructor!

To make sure we were nice and warm but still able to move freely, we had to wear leggings or tracksuit bottoms, two tops, a fleece, a waterproof coat and trainers that we didn’t mind  getting wet. Also, just in case we did get wet, we had to pack an extra set of clothes. When we arrived, we had to make sure we were safe; we had to wear buoyance-aids and helmets (also known as safety caps!)

We started off the traversing day by climbing up a small but rocky wall which then led up to a cliff edge. We then took turns to scramble down a narrow and rocky crevasse. This led to the main stretch of rocks that we clambered and jumped over crashing waves. After this we had lunch in the minibus.

After lunch we went along the cliff to a more harsh and windy area. This is where we had to put our harnesses on and attach our carabina clips. This is where Amelia and Holly decided to run down the hill attached to each other’s harnesses which sent Amelia tumbling! While we waited for Jez to set up our course, we all huddled together on the grass to keep out of the wind. We then made our way down and along the cliff face in threes, attached to a rope.

The final thing we did was the Tyrolean traverse. This is where we hung upside down on a rope and pulled ourselves along. If we wanted to we could do a flip in the middle of the two ends.

It was a refreshing day away from walking up the mountains and we are looking forward to the activities coming up.

By: Abbie Debling and Evie Anderson

 

Devil’s Kitchen & Co.

Posted on | By Mr Taylor

The day began well. Lovely weather, a lovely, cheap ‘Greggs’ and 9 lovely kids looking forwards to walking for 4 hours straight.
What could possibly go wrong?

Veering off left, we strolled into ‘Tin-can Alley’. Our first stop on our tiresome journey made out to be harmless, until a wild ‘Caterpillar’ stopped us in our tracks as we saved the ‘Caterpillar’ from a harsh stepping on, after taking a quick photo of it.
As if a rogue caterpillar was not enough, we had a strange encounter with a herd of horses.

Further on in our trek, we discovered a rather large pile of rocks. Curiosity filled our small minds and we questioned our Pack Leader, Mary, on what these large piles of rocks were.
The ‘massive mountain of rocks’ are considered to provide good luck to the mountain hikers who add a rock to the pile. Whether this was true or not, we added rocks to the pile anyway just to be sure.

The rest of the way to the top was a tough scramble. We clambered up the crumbly shingle and if we didn’t watch our step we could have fallen – maybe the rocks were lucky considering we all returned safely; we arrived successfully at the top. The wind roared in our ears, half-deafening us, it was freezing compared to the blazing sunshine we’d had on the way up. The way back down took a more interesting route as we stumbled down the high peak to a lake… here we had a sit down and caught our breath. After that we continued on our tiring journey to the biggest challenge of them all.
Descending ‘Devil’s Kitchen’.

(WARNING TO READER: This is where most things go wrong).

The slippery slope was like a death slide into a pit of dangerous rocks. One wrong move could result in certain death – or a scratch – you never know… Next, we found ourselves sitting on a lovely wall.
It wasn’t so lovely actually, it really hurt to sit on to be honest because the rocks dug up into your legs. And that hurts. Trust me. By this ‘lovely’ wall was a quaint waterfall. A small waterfall that you could drink from. The water was extremely tasty, I, in my opinion, have never tasted water so fresh.
After drinking this refreshing, natural water to quench our thirst, we scaled the wall and dropped down onto the other side. Now, the real fun begins. We struggled to remain balanced as we stumbled down the rocky, wet steps. These steps are either very small and close together or very large and about 5 miles away from each other, so yes, very annoying. After several trips, we banded together to help each other. This was a very good idea, because this place is named ‘Devil’s Kitchen’ for a reason. So we all decided to help each other. Slightly further down some of us came across a dark cave. Some of the more brazen of us decided to explore this cave, however they didn’t find much. Afterwards we discovered a ‘falling’ rock. It took two of us to ‘hold it back up’-ish… After this the struggles were over and we steadily descended down to another lake where many of us decided to skim rocks across it. A record of 6 was created; but not broken… We walked on slightly further and our hike was over and although there were some scarier moments; we came back happy and safe (with a few added blisters).

By Amelie Kemp and Erin White

Y Garn

Climbing our first ever ‘mahoosive’ mountain

Posted on | By Mr Alderson

After our scrumptious breakfast, we went back to our room to collect our equipment; we were then ready for the day. Our group leader (Mr Alderson) then called us all down and gathered us together so that we could get our walking boots on (that for me was very uncomfortable).
We were all very excited knowing that we would be going to a mountain to reach the peak. When we finally reached the destination, all of our faces dropped with fear as we saw the height of it. We were all thinking to ourselves that we were going to slip off as it looked so narrow! however, “Brave” boy Harvey was confident that we would all reach the summit.
We “quickly” started up the road which seemed as if it lasted forever. As we were halfway up the road, we stopped for a drink. Next thing we heard was a smash of Mason’s flask, carrying his favourite and only drink, tea… well done Mason!
Half of the time I was at the back, as I tried to use my hands and knees to crawl across the slate during the very narrow bits. The bit that scared me the most was where we climbed up the side of the first mountain and there was a massive drop right next to us leading to definite death. My legs could not stop shaking; I had never felt so alive! Luckily, I had my best mate Todd behind me to keep me going. Last time I felt scared like this was when I was in a plane with huge turbulence.
Travelling behind us were the four ‘mountaineers,’ Todd, Oli, Mason and Lucy; they then caught up to the rest of the group.
Lucy, Beth and Eliza volunteered to go right, near the edge of the path, and were very brave, because if they slipped, they would have gone for a nice swim in the lake!
We had all got to the summit of the mountain and were very cold, however, Oli Aitkin decided to take off his jacket as it was apparently annoying him.

By Harvey McIntyre and Mason Miller

A beautiful day up Yr Aran

Posted on | By Mr Alderson

Today was our first day of doing a main, challenging activity.We started our day with a nice, filling English Breakfast and sorted into our groups of 9 or 10 and given our instructor (Anne). We were then told that we were going to climb a 747m tall mountain called Yr Aran.

We set out on our journey up the mountain, and after only a few hundred meters our legs began to ache but we stayed optimistic purely because of Josh’s joyful singing. All the way up the mountain our instructor Anne made us take it in turns to carry a rope around our shoulders (in case of an emergency) and then that person took the lead to set the pace. We then continued our journey past many streams and a lot of grass.

We walked past our first stream – out of the many we saw – and surprisingly Josh and Ben decided that they were extremely dehydrated and just had to attempt to lap up the whole stream as if they were camels in a desert! They soon realised that the water was freezing and got up from the ground and smiled with their blue lips. Although it was cold, they insisted that the water was nicer than tap water even though they had no idea what anyone could have done upstream.

After a long walk that was described by the instructor as  ‘a third’ of the way there, we stopped for one snack out of our lunch boxes . This one snack slowly turned into two or three but we were told by Anne to save some for the summit.

We walked and walked and walked and walked but we also took some stops for some people to catch up (Olly). We have nominated him for the tortoise award! Olly’s only motivation to reach the summit was Mr.Stavri’s bottle of water, he followed him like a donkey. Olly talking here, “It was because I was taking lots of wonderful photos”.

We finally reached the peak and ate the remainders of our lunches with a beautiful view of Snowdon. everyone’s legs were tired but it was only Holly who decided to actually take a nap on the mountain. We then began our descent which was many times faster than our climb.

By Katy Gray and Olly Ansell

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