We slept in, and then drove up to Northern Wales (about 2 hours). We got into the beautiful national park called Snowdonia. It was breathtaking and the weather was gorgeous! We drove around for a bit, and stopped to take some pictures that showed Mt. Snowdon in the background. We planned on climbing it later that day. A friend told us to visit Electric Mountain, which is the largest hydro-power station in Europe. It is hidden in the mountain side, so you cannot even notice it when driving by. We stopped in (after paying for 4 hours of parking) to get a tour. Sadly, they were booked for the day. So we decided to go find parking to climb Snowdon...just to find that all the lots to get to the path we were planning on taking were full. We headed back to the parking lot we just left to pay for parking for a second time. We were slowly giving up on this adventure, therefore we were just going to take the train to the top of the mountain. Lazy, I know. We got to the train station to find that the trains were all booked for the day. We were striking out hard.
In the National Park
Snowdon is to the right of Jeff's head
We gave up altogether, and headed to Conwy Castle, which was about a 30 minute drive away. We paid for parking for a third time, but the third time was the charm here. The city was gorgeous, and it was partially walled city like York. We walked around in the castle grounds for a while. It was all open, no rooms like you may be picturing. We climbed up a couple tours to not only have a beautiful view of the ocean, but the countryside as well. We didn't spend a lot of time there, but we did enjoy the sights. It was funny because there was a huge group of Americans touring the castle as well. Some of which were being the stereotypical American tourists, and we hoped we never acted like them on our trips. Ha! We walked a little bit of the city walls, and then headed into the heart of the city.
Inner part of the castle
Jeff and I headed down to the waterside, but before , we stopped in this small fish & chips shop. We didn't have a plan to go there, but it was highly rated...even by Rick Steves. For those of you who do not know him, he is an American author who travels around Europe writing about the do's/don'ts of European travel. We have browsed through a few of his books, and he is honest and truthful about the places to see and not see. But anyway---no joke on these fish & chips. I don't really like fish, but this was excellent! So greasy...yummo! We walked down to sit near the water to enjoy our snack.
The sign can't lie "probably the best" 
Next to the water was also the Smallest House in Great Britain, so for a pound ($1.50) you could take a picture and see the inside. I paid the money, as Jeff didn't care much about it. It was SO small. I tried to take a couple pictures, but you could never get a good angle because of the size. Go figure, right? Well worth the pound. Jeff and I headed back to the car before traveling back to the hotel for the night.
Since we failed at the planning portion of Day #1 in Wales, we woke up early to head to the top of Snowdon. A little bit about Snowdon...
- It is over 1,000 meters high (over 3,500 feet)
- Highest mountain in Wales
- You can get to the top by foot or by train
- Around 350,000 people make it to the summit each year (train and/or foot)
- Snowdon means "snow hill"---often being able to see some snow at the top
- If the weather is right, you can see England, Ireland, and Scotland from the summit
- Takes the average person 6 hours to get to the top and back down by foot (train is 2 hours round trip).
The first path we walked on.
On our walk to the top!
Our walk started out so peacefully, as we were walking along a path alongside some beautiful lakes. I was thinking, "Wow this won't be too bad". My opinion quickly changed when we started putting some elevation in the mix and on top of it all the "paths" were gone and we were climbing up makeshift routes. At one point Jeff and I just stood there, looking up, wondering which way to go as we saw no path. We climbed through some large rocks, and climbed up that way. We didn't take very many pictures at this point, as we were focusing on where to walk safely.
One of the "paths" This was definitely mild compared to our other routes.
We made it to the top in about 2 hours and 15 minutes, and that was with some "catch our breath" breaks. We were so glad that we made it to the top so early. Jeff and I made it to the top by 9:30, which was nice given the train didn't start dropping people off until 10:00. We had some time on the summit to enjoy the scenery, er, white background. It reminded me of our trip to Dover Cliffs, and we could not see a thing. The frustrating part is the day before was beautiful, so I can only imagine how much you could see if we climbed it like our original plan.
Our friends have said that you can see the countryside for miles...guess we picked the wrong day!
The first train of the day. It was so cold, windy, and rainy at the top!
It only took us an hour and 45 minutes to get down. We actually headed down a different path by accident. It was SO much easier than the path we took to the top. I think it would have been an even shorter trip to the bottom if we would have found the spot where we were basically going vertical.
Afterwards, we headed back to Nottingham. Surprisingly it was only a 3 hour ride home. Crazy to think about the UK and its size. How cool to be near the water, on a mountain, in the city, or in the countryside all within a short drive.
On to the next adventure...
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