Walks
Croesor Bach sits on the slopes of Cnicht. To climb the mountain, simply go over the stile by the workshop but don’t head straight for the summit (too/steep, many walls etc).
Instead head up past the stable (under the big pine tree), up a little bluff, then head left-ish until you hit the stone wall beside a boggy spring area. Please do not try to climb the wall – stone walling experts charge hundreds of pounds per yard for rebuilding damaged walls. Instead, go through the sheep gate where the walls meet [near the spring, a narrow gap about 18″ wide, for sheep to walk through, see imagery from Google Maps below]. There’s a wide plateau which you can’t see from the house – the track snakes north-west across it and up onto the ridge.
Follow the ridge path:
All the high ground has “Right to roam” status. Beyond the ridge to the north there is a wild region without paths:
It is possible to continue from the top of Cnicht right around the head of the valley, returning on the path from the Rhosydd quarry – it took me 3.5 hours, walking very fast.
For a gentler walk, take the route of the Croesor Tramway up the middle of the valley :
Croesor mine
Another nice walk follows the track up the southern side of the valley to the Croesor mine – about 1 1/4 hours up, perhaps 45 minutes down.
All that’s left now above ground is a huge slate region (a good place for a picnic) that was once covered in cutting sheds and the enormous walls of a winding machine house.
For more photos see Dave Slattery’s Flickr page.
The mine entrance is just a small opening but, underground, this mountain (Moelwyn Mawr) has been hollowed out on 7 levels – three below the entrance, four above. The lower ones are now flooded but cavers can still enter here, travel right through the mountain and come out through mine workings on the Blaenau Ffestiniog side. This is a dangerous hobby – there are frequent rock falls. (One of the caverns was, for a while, the largest in Britain but it was so large the ceiling could not support its own weight and it completely collapsed).
The Croesor-Rhosydd Through Trip is described as one of the classic “do before you die” routes for cavers – see The Chamber of Horrors and YouTube videos (1), (2) also map, section and photo albums. Originally this quarry was lit by 2000 candle power arc lights using its own electricity generated by the power station at the head of the valley.
See Wikipedia. A 1911 account of the quarry is here.
The Croesor mine was worked from 1846 until 1878 and again from 1895 to 1930.
Whilst most Welsh quarries used narrow gauge steam locomotives, the Croesor quarry started with horse-drawn trolleys and then progressed to electric locomotives. A hanging valley 820 feet above the valley floor was dammed to make a reservoir: the water then flowed at high pressure down through pipes to the quarry’s hydro-electric power station. In winter it was not unknown for the pipes to freeze and burst. The water pressure was, of course, sufficient to squirt it back 820 feet into the air – the “water spout” could be seen from Porthmadog.
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