Rhinog Fawr Route 3
A rocky route to Snowdonia’s hauntingly beautiful nature reserve
The Rhinogydd is characterised by unruly and seemingly impenetrable slopes of scree, crags and heather. To the uninitiated they seem like a difficult to proposition, however, for those who don’t mind doing a bit of judicious bypassing, these rocky peaks are the perfect playground. A popular way to tackle the summits is to do them in one full-range traverse as this is a superb outing but, in the process of covering the distance, each peak tends to merge into a blur. These fine mountains deserve more than just being another tick on a long list, so why not do one at a time and enjoy exploring this hauntingly beautiful corner of Snowdonia.
Rhinog Fawr is a prime mountain for an out-and-back walk. It does sit reasonably close to its twin Rhinog Fach, but there is little around it to block the view and it has a grandly independent air about it. By starting off at the beautifully situated road head at Cwm Bychan you can exploit the wellgraded footpath that climbs steadily to the Roman Steps. From here a brief descent over Bwlch Tyddiad, a crafty sidestep via Llyn Du and then a handrail beside an old drystone wall gets you into the perfect position to ascend the more forgiving slopes of the north-west face to the summit.