Caernarfon; Saturday, 06 May, 2017

I was up early as I wanted to make sure I made the early Welsh Highland Railway train up through Snowdonia. I got to the ticket office early, but even then there were still a fair number of people already waiting.

The train left a couple of minutes late and bursting at the seams – thankfully I’d managed to get a window seat, so I was able to take in the stunning Snowdon scenery as the train headed up into the mountains before descending back down to sea level at Porthmadog.

I had a bit of a wander round Porthmadog as I had nearly an hour to kill before the bus back to Caernarfon where I stopped off for some lunch.

As it was a bit of an overcast afternoon, and with the castle pencilled in for the following day, there wasn’t much else to do in Caernarfon so I decided to go for another ride into the mountains, this time courtesy of the local buses and the Snowdon Ranger service.

I took the bus into Llanberis and then picked up the bus up to Pen-y-Pass. Up at Pen-y-Pass I had a bit of a wander around, feeling quite out of place as I was the only one in jeans and trainers – clearly ill prepared for a trek up a mountain, but perfectly kitted out for using Public transport to reach the interesting places.

After having had a wander round the visitors centre and a cup of hot chocolate in the café it was time to catch the next bus down the other side of the hill and on into Betwys-y-Coed. Again, I had a little wander round the town here, again feeling out of place with my lack of hiking gear, before picking up the next bus back up the mountains into the slate mining areas of Blaenau Ffestiniog. This was probably the most interesting leg of the journey as the small bus powered its way up through green hills before cresting one and descending into the lunar landscape of the slate mining mountains – centuries of waste slate littering the sides of the hill making the whole area look very grey.

Down in Blaenau I hopped on the national rail train back down the Conwy Valley and onto Llandudno where I stopped for a quick dinner before catching a late bus back through Bangor to Caernarfon and my welcoming hotel bed.