Rhinog Fawr and Rhinog Fach

Sat 3 September 2022

After a hiatus of  nearly three years, Vince, Jack and I at last got away to Wales for a weekend of hillwalking. Our last trip together was in October 2019, the COVID-19 pandemic put paid to any trips in 2020-21.

We stayed at our regular haunt, the Wynnstay Arms in Llanbrynmair. This has been a great base for some of our trips, but sadly it is now up for sale, so maybe this was our last visit. The landlady, Pauline, has always looked after us well. We learnt from her that she has been running the place for 36 years, but now, at the age of 81, she has decided that it is time for her to put her feet up and relax. She happily  agreed to prepare breakfast for us at 7:00am on the Saturday and 7:30am on Sunday. We ordered in advance because on our last visit her huge breakfasts defeated us.

Anyway, our plan for Saturday was to do the main group of Rhinogs – 6 peaks in all. It was raining when we got up, but as we had breakfast the hills to the south of Llanbrynmair began to emerge from the low cloud, giving rise to some optimism for the day. We left the pub at 8:00am for the 45 mile drive to Cwm Nantcol where the walk would begin. We picked up Laura, a friend of Vince,  en-route. As we continued the heavens opened and it threw it down. Things began to look very bleak for our walk. But as we continued the rain began to ease and it had all but ceased by the time we turned onto the minor road that led to the head of Cwm Nantcol. This was a very narrow road, but luckily we met nothing coming in the other direction, much to my relief. It was also gated and Jack did the honours of jumping out to open each gate. On the return journey we took a slightly different route out of the cwm, so Jack was not needed on gate duty again. He said that there must have been at least twelve gates to open but I can only count six marked on the OS Landranger map!

We found a parking spot near Cil-cychwyn, but not before Jack had re-acquainted himself with his breakfast. Actually we discovered that there were more parking areas further on, but as the day turned out, we had parked in a more convenient place for our return.

Once we had our boots on (luckily we did not need to don waterproofs) we set off, initially for a couple of kilometres on metalled road to the head of Cwm Nantcol, then north on a track past Nantcol farmhouse. A ladder stile took us over a wall through some reedy ground and over another wall. More reedy ground (not pleasant) and more walls and we were on the open hillside. There was no sign of the right of way marked on the OS map, nor of the cairned path mentioned by Nuttall. We struggled upwards through the heather covered hillside.

The wall west of the summit came into view and we headed towards it. Clambering over it we then soon found a path that led us to the trig pillar on Rhinog Fawr. After the usual summit photos we moved into the cairn/shelter for a coffee and banana break.

The descent off Rhinog Fawr proved to be somewhat tricky. Fine initially, heading eastwards on a well defined path. But this soon disappeared and we were amongst the rocks and crags with no clear route down. We wandered around trying to find a safe route but there was no obvious choice. In the end we backtracked slightly and decided a route initially rejected was the only feasible option. Quite a hands-on descent, eventually following a wall down to Bwlch Drws-Ardudwy. It took us the best part of 90 minutes to descend the 370m to the bwlch, where we stopped and had lunch sat atop a large boulder (sadly, no pics).

So, onward to Rhinog Fach. There looked to be only one feasible way up, and it was steep. We walked east for 300m and then turned right to ascend the north flank. Not only was it steep, but there was not much other than heather to cling on to – not ideal. We made slow progress upwards, but there were great views of Rhinog Fawr and the craggy and boulder strewn hillside that we had descended earlier. We headed for a break in the rocky defences which led us less steeply upwards in a southerly direction, initially on grass and then over large rocks which made for a nice scramble. At the top of this rocky slope there was a clear path that led us easily to the summit cairn.

It was 15:20 when we summited Rhinog Fach, and it was clear to us that we were not going to have enough time to complete the other four summits in the range. We would have to abort the rest of the walk and find a route back to the car. We continued on the planned route down to Llyn Hywell – a nice rocky scramble. Rather than continue on the ascent of Y Llethr, we skirted anti-clockwise around the llyn and followed a path south-west past Llyn Perfeddau. From the outfall of this little lake the path continued until it met a wall, which we followed for 300m to a ladder stile. Crossing the wall, a path continued past a disused level, where we stopped for a short break. We were then on a clear right-of-way that led us the 2km back to Cil-cychwyn where the car was parked.

There were only a couple of brief, light showers during the day, and although the sky remained overcast and we did not complete all the summits we intended, it was a pretty good day in the hills.

More photos here

	Summit	Height (m)		Status
	Rhinog Fawr	720		Hewitt, Marilyn, Nuttall
	Rhinog Fach	712		Hewitt, Nuttall