This would be my first mini expedition with my shiny new Lowe Alpine AirZone Pro 35:45 rucksack, which had bought not for this kind of use, but for single-day (or single night) ML work. Because of this, I did a careful test loading at home, to make sure it would take everything without being full to bursting, which it did; the alternative would have been to use my 75-litre expedition rucksack, but it too big for single-day ML work, and I did not want to take too rucksacks with me in the car.
I parked at a friendly location in Llanberis where |I could leave my car for a few days, and made an estimate pf how much usable daylight there was left -- I wanted to have all my camping tasks finished without using my head torch to give away my position. I selected the nearest of a set of sites I had identified a few days earlier (by examining the map), all of them in Open Access land, and headed off in a jaunty mood on a fine late summer's evening up the valley of the Afon Arddu.
I arrived at the site, checked that it was actually suitable, and quickly put up my tent. It is the tent-putting-up phase in which one is most vulnerable to discovery, I think, and even though I was doing nothing unlawful or wrong, I wanted to be discovered as little as possible. With the tent in place and providing a low-profile dark-green cover for my and my kit, I was then able to get on with the rest of the tasks of the evening, and spend some time just enjoying being there.
The spot I had chosen was magical. The air was clear and clean, and there were pin-sharp views of Clogwyn Du'r Arddu and the ridge which was my objective for the hike the next day, picked out in rich red tones from the setting sun against the crisp blue sky, and Moel Cynghorion in near silhouette to the right. I could see great lengths of the Snowdon mountain railway on the flanks of the ridge, and the lights of the signals at Hebron Station and Half Way Station, especially after sunset. In the background was the splash and murmur, and the occasional deep glug, of the rushing waters of the Afon Arddu.
Some runners went past on the footpath just 50m away, and I hid inside my tent, hoping not to be seen. A few minutes later, some mountain bikers rode past, and similarly, I ducked inside my tent so as not to be found.
As the dark was stealing over the land and the last train had made its way back to the engine shed, the signals at Hebron Station and Half Way Station went out, and I was left with the sounds of the river and of the leaves in the trees in the light wind. The river has seemed fairly quiet when it was still daylight, but now that it was nearly night and my hearing had become more acute, the gentle murmur seemed more like a sustained roar, and the and the occasional glug sounded as if someone were throwing large stones rocks into the pools just upstream of me.
Surrounded by all this beauty, and with my lovely tent, my cosy sleeping bag, and with a good meal inside me, I felt blissfully happy. I stayed awake a few more minutes looking around me, then slipped into my sleeping bag and slept well until just after dawn.
In the morning I had a freshen up, followed by a brew and a good hiking breakfast, then I packed up quickly and headed away from the river to complete my morning tasks. Unfortunately, the resin trowel I had bought (as part of a programme in the late Spring to lighten my kit) snapped as I was digging a cathole, which was inconvenient but could have been worse. I did manage to do what I had to do properly and hygienically, but it was a close call.
At that point I regarded the wild camping as over, and the day hike as starting, so the story continues in the subsequent entry of this blog.
