Is Crib Goch as scary as it looks?
A lot of people arrive for their first Crib Goch day having watched enough footage to know the appearance of almost every bit of the skyline. They’ve seen somebody apparently balancing on a sliver of rock, a camera looking straight down the north face and a drone pulling away to show just how small a person looks up there. It’s understandable that they’re wondering whether they’ve signed up for something ridiculous.
Most of the people who do it with me for the first time tell me afterwards that it wasn’t as frightening or difficult as they’d expected. Some do find it very exposed, though, and I wouldn’t want anyone reading that first sentence as a promise about how they’ll feel. The drops are real. There are places where a slip would have very serious consequences, however undramatic the individual climbing move might be.
What the footage often fails to show is what you’re actually holding and standing on. Camera position and wide-angle lenses can make the ridge look much sharper, while someone leaning out with an action camera gives you a rather different impression from the one you get when you’re looking at a good foothold a few feet away.
There’s also a big difference between seeing the ridge from a distance and moving along it. On our usual crossing towards Yr Wyddfa, the north side falls away very steeply, with drops of around a couple of hundred metres in places. It’s also the shadier side, with more damp rock and vegetation. We usually use the southern side just below the crest, where there are plenty of solid holds, coming onto the top where the route requires it.
That can involve moving sideways while holding the crest, or walking roughly parallel to it with a hand on the rock. You don’t have to tiptoe upright along the whole thing. The ridge changes width as we go, and I’ll explain how we’re approaching each section rather than expect everyone to work that out while worrying about the drop.
Some of the steeper climbing moves are actually on the way up the East Ridge, before the famous narrow section. That’s one reason I pay so much attention to how people are moving early on. Once we reach the skyline, I often stop in a suitable place so everyone can look around properly. You’ve spent a while looking at the rock in front of your face; your eyes and brain sometimes need a moment to catch up with where you’ve arrived.
The main knife-edge section is only around 300 metres long, but it asks for concentration. We move at a pace that suits the group, and nobody needs to make themselves uncomfortable trying to let somebody else rush past.
What catches plenty of people out is how much mountain there is beyond that famous view. The pinnacles are still ahead, followed by Crib y Ddysgl and the rest of the journey. “It was longer than I expected” is something I hear quite often, including from people who found the exposure much more manageable than they’d imagined.
