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| "My Geometry's Foggy" Moel Hebog © Glyn Davies 2012 - Prints from HERE |
The going was very wet underneath, with thick bog and waterlogged grass and the summit of Moel Hebog where I was headed only made very brief appearances. From the North Ridge I followed the very steep hillside alongside a miraculous wall which defied gravity and continued right up and over the summit to drop away to the South West on the far side. To be honest it was welcome shelter from the bitter hill fog which nearer the top would otherwise have ripped through me. As usual, I was alone on the mountain and it was slightly intimidating ascending this vast open mountainside where visibility was down to a few meters, on a hill I'd never climbed before, like an ascent to heaven which would open above me at any minute.
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| "Fogpath Footpath" Moel Hebog © Glyn Davies 2012 - Prints from HERE |
It seems I wasn't going to Heaven after all as the cloud base stayed low and I finally summited in a fast flowing motorway of 50mph cloud. I sheltered behind a trig point and it was so cold I had to eat my sandwiches wearing gloves. The coffee was gorgeous and warm and restored some sanity to this cold hilltop. Almost without me noticing, the sky behind the wall had opened, and this incredible view of sunlit hills opened up over South East Snowdonia, but in the fast hill fog, it was gone before I could even get the camera out. I was becoming more comfortable in this isolated and surreal weather, and mounted the camera to the tripod ready for the next 'appearance' but there was none. Behind me a different view opened up for a couple of minutes with layers of cloud racing under banks of higher cloud, and intense sunlight in one tiny patch over Cardigan Bay on the horizon. It was all rather beautiful as well as cold and surreal, but it would have made a much better video than a still. As a still, the fast moving vapour just appears as white, but on HD video, you would discern the speed, the subtlety of fast change and the noise of the won through the wall behind me.
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| "Volcanic Burn" Llyn Peninsula © Glyn Davies 2012 - Prints from HERE |
Nevertheless, two scenes presented themselves which summed up the character and ambience of what I was experiencing, and on the way off the mountain, back at the col, very low, late afternoon sunshine made an intense effort to break through the cloud over the Llyn Peninsula and I managed a few frames on the telephoto in the five minutes before that too disappeared behind an enormous new weather-front. I'd spent way too much time on the col, hoping the light would become even more spectacular, but it didn't, so I was forced to make a hasty descent in half light back through down the lower slopes through thick bog to the van, waiting for me next to a gurgling brook, in a dark and still deserted valley.
All words and images are strictly copyright © Glyn Davies 2011 - All rights reserved
Glyn's landscapes are all available as 200 year archival prints on his website at www.glyndavies.com
