'It’s not drastically terrible!' Said Amy in her opening speech after arriving the hut. Fortunately, things only improved and a great weekend was had by all!
After a no doubt thrilling day of lectures a fresher heavy group of 46 set off on Friday night dreaming of a weekend of 20+ degree temperatures and bright sunshine throughout! Unfortunately, then the coach arrived and they woke up!
Upon arrival everything was moved into the hut where a horrific discovery was made! In a move that probably violates the Geneva convention, Asda had substituted sweet potatoes for regular potatoes! After some intense discussions and war councils the panic abated and people were able to go to bed! Plan for the Saturday: get up early and go to make the most of the ‘nice’ weather.
Saturday morning:
After mixed amounts of sleep everyone was ready and raring to go in the morning with promises of the occasional bit of sunshine and a bracing windchill of -7 at the peaks! With both scrambling and walking on offer the majority opted for scrambling whilst all the walkers were feeling bold in the face of the challenge of a walk up to the Glyders! I will now pass on to Tom for a report of the scrambling!
Whilst the scramblers decided to take the difficult route and cover a short distance over a long period of time the walkers decided they wanted to see a bit more of Snowdonia! We headed out at a good pace racing along to the café where a break was taken to refuel and grab a much-needed pasty after a gruelling half an hour walk along a flat path around Llyn Ogwen. After that the real walk started with the route taking us around Llyn Idwal before the climb started on the path up through Devil’s Kitchen, the group made good progress and made it through into Devil’s Living room (I’m guessing on the name) where the ground flattened out to provide the perfect lunch spot! High quality lunches were on show throughout mainly consisting of sandwiches containing exotic fillings such as ‘ham’ or ‘cheese’ which meant spirits were high in the group despite the cold and wind! Gloves, hats and extra layers were then added as we prepared to take on the scree slope to the summit (Devil’s driveway?). We started the climb optimistically with nice views appearing of the Snowdon range to our right however this didn’t last long as the hail started to set in, if you thought this would deter the mighty BUMC members then you would be very wrong! We all continued battling through as the hail cleared and was replaced with wind as the summit appeared and was climbed! Mission accomplished and Glyder Fawr completed! After a brief period of rock-hopping we then made it to the top of Glyder Fach and took the customary photo on the very windy cantilever stone! With the peaks done for the day it was time to head back down to the hut to warm up from the wind!
Fortunately, all groups made it back with no casualties lost to the wind and hail, although Tom decided to go for the ‘British tourist just back from Mallorca’ look having seemingly managed to get sunburnt in Wales in October in the cloud (he claims it was from the wind, but we’ll never know!)
Once back in the hut it was time to start the preparation of the world’s largest vegan chilli! An unimaginable quantity of beans and tomatoes were added to the pan alongside some (look away now chefs!) frozen pre-chopped onions and things started to come together. (Please return to the room chefs) Although the chilli was starting to look good there remained one crucial job left to do, a daunting challenge considered impossible for most mere mortals: cooking 4Kg of rice at one time. One man was chosen for the job to try for immortality: Josh Nicholas... It was a treacherous task but soon everything appeared to be coming together, when asked about progress Josh answered “I’m not the rice wizard but I think it’s ok.” He was wrong, he was indeed a rice wizard and all 4Kg was perfectly cooked with the least amount of faff of all BUMC trips! After Tom’s lecture on the pros of aluminium pans the chilli was soon complete! With this the food was served and enjoyed by all members of the club with everything finished and no one going hungry! Then began the games for the evening with some solid attempts at both the pot game and table bouldering before everyone headed to bed!
Rice
Sunday morning began as all days should with a full cooked breakfast with plenty of food for everyone, even if as Matt claimed, “Linda McCartney is a sneaky woman” (for not labelling which sausages were gluten free!). We then split into several different groups for the activities of the day with groups for climbing, walking and bouldering. Surprisingly, we were greeted by sunshine for the whole day! The climbers headed out the back of the hut to use some very conveniently placed top ropes whilst the boulderers headed off to climb a big rock too! The walkers headed out to try and quickly climb Pen Yr Helgi Du however we were unfortunately beaten by time so decided to enjoy the sun and enjoy phone service for the first time that weekend (and crucially check the England vs Afghanistan cricket score! Spoiler alert it didn’t go very well!). Everyone then headed back to the hut to tidy up and return gear. At this point we realised there was one thing left to do: Finish the 12 pints of milk that we had taken, unfortunately there were still about 11 pints left, Tom decided to take on the challenge to at least finish the open bottle, a large quantity of milk was consumed (I think Tom was briefly 50% calcium) however it proved too much and sadly left the disturbing sight of a toilet full of milk. Anyway we managed to pack everything away and made it on the bus just in time to head back and watch South Africa beat France!
Milk
Overall a very good trip enjoyed by all, and a big thanks to everyone who helped out!!
Until next time!
Joseph