2 Night Deep Snow Adventure • A Solo Mountain Camping Trip

Welcome to the Arenic Mountains. This is a tale of conditions that I wasn't quite expecting, a plan that never came to be and a whole new adventure unfolding instead. Oh my goodness! I'm not getting anywhere in a hurry today. It is mid-March and I had planned a 12 kilometre circular route, including a summit of Moyr a 751 metre peak to the southwest of Arenic Faur, but none of that is going to happen. Oh and this is, this is past my knee. You see, as a southerner, prior to this trip, the deepest snow I had ever experienced is just a few inches and here I've arrived in the mountains with a big heavy rucksack, prepared for the cold and the type of snow that I'm used to, but instead finding myself in deep snow drifts and not only were they difficult to travel through, but the worry of getting snowed in if there was another snowfall was really playing on my mind. I can't walk in it. I made it only a kilometre from where I'd parked before realising I couldn't go any further and definitely wouldn't be summiting any peaks. Cutted! I don't think this is happening. I trudged up and down through the drift covered paths, debating what to do. Maybe I was quite literally out of my depth there. I could give up, get back to the car, drive home, but eventually I decided to collect water from a stream and at least have a go at finding somewhere to camp for the night. The route I'd planned was not passable but maybe a Renwick Fowl would let me ascend a way up its low slopes instead. I was just thinking that I'm making nice progress up here and like under the snow. So today has been a total misadventure from the start. Even on a drive up here I got stuck in snow in my car. I'll tell you about it later. Yeah, I'm not used to all this snow and stuff. Well I have somehow made it up to 470 metres and far enough from the road I think that I don't mind it too much. Apologies if you can still hear it. The snow's not too deep here. I'm gonna pitch up because we'll be losing sun. Yeah, all set up in a beautiful... How's that for a beautiful pitch? And it's cold. It's minus three degrees already. I really can't believe how difficult it is to walk in deep snow. I've never experienced snow this deep before so this is all new to me. This whole trip so far has gone completely not to plan whatsoever but it's fine and it's beautiful. I mean look at it. So today I'm wearing waterproof socks which I've never tried before because the last trip in the Marwins I was just sick of having soaked boots and soaked feet all the time. So I thought if I try some waterproof socks and they're damp on the outside and I've got like a thin fine pair of merino socks underneath. Yeah and underneath is completely dry. Oh that's so nice and you know what I haven't had cold feet at all today. Not once because they're nice and dry. Yay! Only thing is because the socks are two pairs on so floofy I couldn't get my boots on so I've had to buy a massive pair of bigger boots but it's fine. It's working well. Let me show you quickly on the map where we've been. So this is the route that I planned about 12 kilometre route up to Moel Hivnon. That's not going to be happening. So I've parked over here and I've come down here and followed this track along fine fine fine and then it's this bit here. The snow is so deep like up to my bum in places and there's streams coming under it so it just felt really sketchy and I was worried about if there's more snow dumped in the night that I wouldn't be able to get out again tomorrow. So I've come from here back down to here filled up my water and then just made a way up to here. That's where we are now for camp at 470 metres on Aranikvau. So I've been having to think about what I want to do tomorrow and I'm none the wiser. I can't get through round to Moel Hivnon as planned and I've ended up halfway up Aranikvau not as planned. It's going to be cold again tomorrow I think and I think the next day it's going to suddenly warm up which worries me because there is a lot of snow up here and that's going to suddenly melt. So I don't know I'm going to sleep on it and I'm just going to evaluate in the morning see what the situation is with the weather and the conditions and I do want to say a massive thank you to three guys who helped me today on the way up here. I got stuck in the snow in my car. I was just driving into the national park and there was a guy in a van like stuck in a ditch in the snow and I thought oh god better turn around and go check he's okay but he was fine and he said that someone was coming out to help him. So I drove up the road and turned into a pull-in to try and turn around start going back the right direction again but I didn't realise how deep the snow was and I got totally stuck. My car would not move, the wheels were just spinning. I didn't have anything on me to put under the wheels obviously there was no wood about. I tried putting a blanket under the wheels and that got me about a foot. Anyway so these three guys came along bless them and they jumped out and they pushed my car as I was revving it back onto the road. Yeah so thank you so much you guys you are amazing and you saved my weekend there. So yeah this goes to show I suppose it's always good to do a little kindness because you never know when you might need one in return and also that despite what media and what not want you to think there's a lot of good people in this world. A lot of kindness. It is 11 o'clock at night it's minus four degrees and it's such a treat to be warm and cosy for a coffee and some chocolate under these stars in the snow. I'm gonna say good night guys so see you in the morning and decide what we're gonna do. Wind's getting up a bit this morning. I've made a bit of an error. So it turns out last night right before bath I drank a fully caffeinated coffee. I'm very caffeine sensitive so I spent all night awake wondering why I felt so jittery and weird. I only just realised this morning what I've done. I feel pretty ropey I won't lie. I don't feel good but the views are beautiful and you know in this tent this morning it was below freezing outside and it was nine degrees in the tent which is absolutely incredible. I really begrudged paying out for this tent when I bought it. I thought there's no way it's gonna be worth that much money but I love it. So I think I've made a plan for today to show you what I'm thinking. So I think today I'm not doing Einigfahr. The snow's too deep. It's too sketchy. I can't get to Mølhavn. So I'm just gonna come back down follow the track back to where I came from and then this is like a little tiny road here so I'm gonna follow this along because that'll be easy hiking and then I'm gonna see if I can take this track here and we should have gorgeous views of Einigfahr and this lake here as well. So I think that'll be beautiful. Let's try that. So hopefully nice lake views for night two. I'm just gonna sit here a little while longer and then we'll go. I might be able to just follow my footsteps back down from yesterday without too much bother. I'm nearly down now. That was really easy. Got to follow all my tracks in the snow from yesterday all the way down. So I will see you over there in a few kilometres. So we have come east a few kilometres down that single track road. Lovely easy walk in. That is Vinkelinn behind me and we're gonna head south now down to Vinnerenigfahr. So that's gonna be lovely and wild I think. We are at, it's just over there. So I think I'm gonna come off this path and go check it out. Snowdrift fun times again. Right let's see if we can get down close to the water. I'm gonna go a bit higher. Anything close is too heathery or it's too close to the water. So yeah let's get this tent up. That was hard work. It's getting cosy. Hello housey. Oh look. I am all sorted. I'm all cosy. I've got some hot food in my belly and we are pitched up at 435 metres on the north easterly side of Aranegfahr which is up there in the clouds now. So we've come around from the north westerly side this morning. I've only travelled five kilometres today just over but that's far enough for me in these conditions. Travelling through deep snow really takes it out of you. Uses a lot of energy. It's hovering around freezing at the moment but the forecast is saying that it's gonna warm up in the night to seven or eight degrees which is why I didn't want to camp down by the lake because I'm worried with this much snow if that all suddenly melts there could be crazy flash flooding and things like that. So I've camped quite high up out of the way. I don't think that'll affect me if it does happen. I'm so pleased with everything I brought with me this weekend again. It's all functioned really really well. Kept me warm and safe and happy. I love it. Oh and I took off those waterproof socks when I got in the tent and my little merino undersocks are completely dry. I can't believe that. That is a game changer for me. It's a pet hate of mine, having wet feet. I hate it. So that's amazing. I'm pitched nice and early today. It's about four o'clock I think so it'll start getting dark in about an hour and I'm just gonna chill out. I might put a film on today. Just relax and have a rest and enjoy being out here listening to the weather. I don't think we'll be getting stars tonight. It is warming up. It's about five degrees now and it's lashing it down outside. I'm gonna bed now guys. See you in the morning. Crazy in here tonight. Morning. The snow is melting and it's warmed up to around seven degrees. The wind last night was crazy. Totally mad. A load of pegs and guys have been ripped out. Wow look. The tent is taking a beating. I did manage to get about six hours sleep. Really broken light sleep because it was so noisy and relentless. So I've not had much rest this weekend. I think that's the strongest wind that the hilly has been subjected to so far. Absolutely fine weather. I say stuff got ripped out but that's gonna happen. I should have got out before bed last night and gone around and tightened everything and checked everything but I didn't because I didn't want to get out of my cozy nook. So that's what happens. I'm gonna have this and then get going. So this one was difficult but that's okay. The more I get to know myself the more I come to realise that I've never really made life particularly easy for myself. I mean I could choose a steady stable job instead of being self-employed in artistic evenings. I could live with someone, share financial burdens and not have to take responsibility for everything all by myself but it seems I enjoy the freedom of doing things the hard way. I don't particularly enjoy feeling safe and comfortable all of the time. Don't get me wrong I love my home comforts. A comfy bed and nice food as much as the next person but too much of it gives me a quiet uneasiness. A restlessness bubbling under the surface. Yeah I could choose not to do this, not to push myself, not to haul a third of my body weight up mountains and then I wouldn't experience the discomfort both physical and mental that comes with these kind of trips. The hard way after all can be quite hard. So is it worth it?