As I sit down to write, the rain that has threatened all day is finally moving beyond a drizzle. I can see the steady fall of it out of the window, landing on the hawthorn and wild roses outside like a promise. Weeks of unseasonal dry weather are being repaired, the waterfall just behind the house we’re staying in gushing into life. It is a gentle, restful rain, not heavy enough to silence the birds, nor really heavy enough to put a stop to going out. But this is the last day of our trip to Eryri, and we’ve done enough to justify a quiet afternoon in front of the fire.
Of all the places in the world, it is the mountains, lakes and valleys of Eryri that feel like home. Surprisingly, perhaps, having never lived here. But my family came from one of the quarrying villages, and stories of this landscape have followed me throughout my life. As a child peering out of the rear windows of the car I marvelled at the peaks as they appeared out of the cloud; by my early teens, I was craning my neck to see the climbers in their lurid tights, watching in awe as they climbed the forbidding faces of the Pass. Once my own explorations began, that sense of awe was joined by a joyful sense of belonging; whether I was scrambling, climbing, walking or running, what I needed was to place myself firmly in this landscape as often as possible. This is where I ground and heal myself.
I have never needed that more than after the last six months, so this trip has been a celebration – the treatment is behind me now, it is time to look forward and get back out there. And I have been very lucky, two fantastic runs during a three day family holiday is good going indeed. I may be being slightly generous calling them both runs, but I was wearing running shoes and ran a good proportion of the routes, so I’m going to allow it. My fitness isn’t really high enough for the elevation on these routes, but it didn’t matter. This was not about times or pace, it was simply about getting back into the landscape I love, perhaps about getting a sense of myself back again.
My first run was a four mile trot up Foel Felen that turned into a mini adventure. As I climbed up out of Dolwyddelan the path shrank to nothing more than the vaguest hint that someone had trodden that way before me, weaving between small pine trees and silver birch, gorse hidden by the heather, ready to snag a passing leg. The summit itself gave no hint of anyone having been there, only me and the sheep, and the most wonderful views across to the summit of Yr Wyddfa, to Moel Siabod and down to Cnicht. In a few months time I’d be resting there and feasting on blueberries, but this early in the year it was enough just to take in the peace and solitude.
The descent looked, on paper, like a straightforward route down through some woods back to the house. But this adventure wasn’t done with me yet. I crossed the stile into the woods and the path disappeared completely, leaving me making my way through pillows of moss, crawling under trees, and working hard to keep aiming for the fence line on the map that would hopefully lead to another stile and way out. Much like the way into the woods, the way out had a clear stile and a path, yet no obvious route to connect the two that I had missed. This small section of wood was perhaps a quarter mile wide at most, yet felt like another world entirely, one with no evidence of human life. There were mosses so deep I sank in them nearly up to my knees, in an array of colours I have never seen before. In this Tolkienesque landscape the rest of the world faded away for a while, replaced by lush greens, birdsong, the whisper of the wind through the higher branches. It is only because I could look at my run data once I finished that I know I was there for minutes, that I had not lost hours or centuries wandering through the forest.
My second run was less adventurous but no less beautiful, tracking up through the Gwydir forest to Llyn Elsi above Betws y Coed then back down the Roman road, Sarn Helen, to Pont y Pant. There were no vanishing paths today, although a very overgrown section had me face-planting a branch when I didn’t look up soon enough. The rain mostly held off, just a gentle shower as I rounded the lake, the rain pattering on my shoulders as I paused to watch my breath make new little clouds over the water. The three people sharing a flask across the lake were the only people I saw during either run, not even the ghosts of the legionaries were out as I came back along the Roman Road. I had wanted – needed – solitude in the mountains, and this is exactly what I had.
Visits up here are never long enough, and this one has to end tomorrow. But that’s ok. Two wonderful runs in the place I love the most will keep me going for quite some time now. I will leave having refreshed my soul, reminded myself of what my body is capable of, and with a whole new list of ideas for future adventures in my mind. If I am to achieve my goal of a 50 mile race in October there will need to be rather more actual running on my runs going forward. To have these two glorious runs in my mental bank makes everything else more achievable.
I Run Free 