Justine’s Blog

We’ve really been taking advantage of the snow and sunshine in Wales over the last couple of weeks and the last 2 days Barry and I did something I hadn’t really thought I’d do in Wales – we went skiing!

Neither of us have touring skis so we carried our skis and boots up to the top of a couple of big snowy hills, swapped walking boots for ski boots and skied back down. Yesterday we went in the Ogwen Valley and took 2 hours to trudge up a long snowy ridge. I don’t know how long it took us to get down, but it was much much quicker!! We stopped quite a few times to savour it.

Today we went with Nick, Matt & Mark into the Carneddi and had a great outing. We carried the skis up almost 600metres – and thankfully the snow was harder today so our ski boots didn’t break through the surface as often and it wasn’t that bad walking uphill. The others had touring bindings and skinned up the hill – it looked a lot easier and more fun… I definitely have to get a pair of touring skis! The downhill was great fun – not the best snow in the world but none of us cared, we were out skiing in our backyard – Barry and I could even see our house across the valley as we were walking up.

Nick & Matt have been working hard on a new instructinal DVD that they will be releasing in the next month or so called “Kayak Essentials“

I haven’t been working hard enough on my canoeing DVD, “This is Canoeing” but I’m back on the case tomorrow morning and will stop myself from looking out of the window for the next week or so to try to get the editing finished.

I was obviously a very good girl this year as Santa was very kind to me!

It all started a few weeks ago when Barry and I paddled out to Bardsey island and stayed overnight with the family who lives there year round. We had a great time, bought a few christmas presents ( homemade Bardsey island rugs & hats, and hand woven willow) & caught up with Steve, Jo, Rachel & Ben. Their daughter, Rachel, loves art and showed us her GCSE art projects which were really imaginative and beautiful. I particularly liked a charcoal painting she had drawn of a seal. 

We returned home and a week or so later, Barry told me that he would have to lie to me over the next week – but all in my best interests of course! I knew his lies involved making something out of wood, but I could never imagine that when he left home telling me he was going to work, he really drove down the Llyn Peninsula, paddled to Bardsey in a force 5 westerly & lumpy seas to pick up a charcoal painting that he’d commissioned Rachel to paint for me! When he got home that evening, I had no idea where he’d been!! He then disappeared off to make a lovely frame out of a big piece of elm and gave me the end result. The seal charcoal by Rachel is her first commission, but I don’t think it will be her last!!

RACHEL – CHICKEN & TURKEY FEEDER AND ARTIST!

Today was so beautiful with sunshine, blue sky and great snowy conditions on the mountains. How could I spend the day inside knowing that friends were out making the most of these pretty rare conditions in Wales? So I postponed starting work again and spent the day out in the hills with Clare & John D (they didn’t have to twist my arm very hard!). 

We did that classic Welsh walk – the Snowdon horeshoe, up the knife edge Crib Goch ridge, down, round and up to the highest peak in Wales, then down via the striking peak of Y Lliwedd. We were glad of our crampons and axes on some of the scrambly bits and the spikes stayed on our boots for most of the day. I’m home now and still smiling from a great day out on the hills. 

Time to start back on “This is Canoeing” now I’m energised from lots of fun playing outside!

CLARE ON CRIB GOCH, SNOWDON SUMMIT IS DIRECTLY BEHIND HER
ONE OF THE PINNACLES ON CRIB GOCH

A cold wintery spell has lingered over Wales for the last 2 weeks allowing us to get out and enjoy some great snowy walks and scrambles over the festive season.

Yesterday a group of us tried to climb up Snowdon up the Watkins path, but it’s not a well used footpath so once we started to climb more steeply we lost the path and were wading through knee to thigh deep snow making very slow progress. The short days and deteriorating weather persuaded us to head back down once we’d reached the ridge by Y Lliwedd. Today we walked the Nantle ridge – a lower but very beautiful walk with a few scrambly bits. What a gorgeous clear sunny day with great views to Snowdon behind us and the Llyn Peninsula with sea on both sides. 

Life is good!