By: Blonde One

A Blonde trip to North Wales would not be complete without a visit to ‘legendary’ Llanberis. This village has a lot going on and needed some investigation. It was a quirky place that was bright and cheery despite the dull, post Christmas, weather. The High Street was painted with a mix of vibrant colours to cheer us up (not that we needed it).

There were more outdoorsy shops in this High Street than I have seen in one street before, including Joe Brown’s which was full of enticing things just crying out to be bought. The photo shows just one of the walls of stock: this one full of books, gloves and a few of what seemed to be hundreds of ice axes.

We stopped at the famous (?) café Pete’s Eats for the obligatory pint of tea. We sat admiring the walls full of photos of adventures, half listening to others sharing stories of big and small adventures, and admiring various items of outdoor kit being worn by other diners. The place was bright and clean, despite the muddy boots and paws, and gave us a good value lunch. Although it is a bit of a ‘Mecca’ for outdoors enthusiasts, I still think that our very own Foxtor café in Princetown has the edge!

 

For that bit of history and culture that every trip should include we visited the slate museum to learn about how the quarry operated in times gone by. It was well worth a visit and surprisingly free to enter!

The last thing that Llanberis is home to, is our very own friend and fellow OS Champion, Jason. Although I didn’t get to catch up with him in person our paths did, unbeknownst to us, cross at the top of Mount Snowdon!