The Carneddau (lit. "the cairns"; Carneddau is a Welsh plural form, and is sometimes anglicised to Carnedds) are a group of mountains in Snowdonia, Wales. They include the largest contiguous areas of high ground (over 2,500 or 3,000 feet (910 m) high) in Wales and England, as well as six or seven of the highest peaks in the country—the Fourteen Peaks. The range also encloses a number of lakes such as Llyn Cowlyd and Llyn Eigiau, and the Aber Falls waterfalls. It is delimited by the Irish Sea to the north, the Conwy valley to the east, and by the A5 road from Betws-y-Coed to Bethesda to the south and west. The area covers nearly 200 square kilometres, about 10% of the area of Snowdonia.
After an early start from London at 6:00 am we arrived to a very wet and windy day. My two clients wanted to go walking, learn to navigate and do some scrambling. We began with a map session in the car before heading into the rain and up to Cwm Lloer. We began with map orientation and interpreting the maps and progressed from there, planning what we would see, using catching features, ticking features off, timings, contours, bearings and ended with pacings. The original plan had been to head up Pen Yr Ole Wen and Carnedd Dafydd, but the rain and the wind increased and both clients were tired so we decided to stay lower and go looking for features on the landscape instead. It was a productive day, both clients enjoyed themselves and grasped the basics of navigation.
