In May of 2025, I boarded a plane bound for the UK with a friend. Our plan was to hike as much of the northern section of the Cambrian Way as we could in 10 days. The Cambrian Way traverses Wales, starting in the South in Cardiff and ending in the North in Conwy. The route makes a point of hitting as many peaks as possible. Since we only had long enough to do a single section, we chose to start in the North in Conwy and hike in reverse as far as we could. I included a small gallery of pictures along the way. The pictures are ordered to start in Conwy on day 1, and the last one is leaving Barmouth on day 7. I am making this post to share my memories from this hike.

Before we started, we did not know what to expect. Neither of us had done any serious through-hiking, and my friend did not even have much experience with hiking in general. We were a little bit caught off guard, though, since our first day ended up being fairly challenging. Looking back, it was the most difficult stage we did. It was both far and steep. We were low on water, so we needed to get to a water source to pitch camp. At the end of the day, we started feeling better. All we had was about a mile to get off the ridge to finish the stage, and we had a little bit of daylight left. The descent off the ridge, however, was very challenging. There were times we had to take off our bags to climb down. About half way down, we found a stream. We were losing light, so we decided to camp now that we could.

The next day felt a lot better. It was still steep, but the distance was shorter. From the second day on, we started to develop a rhythm. On the third day, we hiked Snowdon, the tallest mountain in Wales. Neither of us realized that it was Snowdon until we reached the top and saw the visitor center. The picture in the center of the gallery shows Snowdon.

Two days later, another friend of mine met up with us for the last few days of hiking. He joined us the night before the stage that ends in Barmouth. This stage felt quite similar to our first day. The distance was very far, and the terrain was very steep. We barely made it into Barmouth, and were very happy to have a shower and a warm meal. After that stage, we started later the next day, and spent the net two days completing the next stage. The last stages to the end of the northern section were easier as well. The slower pace made the last few days of hiking much more relaxing, and also convinced my friend to stick with it until the end.

The friend who hiked the whole way with me does not really have an online presence. The other one has a website which can be found here.