This summit was attempted on Sunday 6th July 2003, by myself, accompanied by Jimmy and Liam.

Two downsides of the previous night's camping at Gwynant - the midges were more numerous and vicious than I have ever experienced, evening and morning, and for some strange reason that night I hardly slept a wink. Now I don't have any trouble sleeping generally, and I was comfortable in my tent - and very tired. So it remains a mystery to me why I only managed to sleep between 3.30am and 5am, and that rather held me back for the following day.

My original plan for the Sunday was to complete a circuit of Yr Aran, Snowdon and Y Lliwedd. Further investigation and discussion convinced me that this would be totally impossible, especially with the two boys. After toying with a rather dodgy idea of takng the train up to Snowdon, then walking down the ridge to the coll and then ascending 247m to Yr Aran and activating it, before then climbing back up the 585m ascent up the ridge back to Snowdon and activating that and returning down on the train, I decided in the end to walk up to Yr Aran from the start of the Watkin Path on the A498, and then continue onto Snowdon before finally descending on the mountain railway.

However, these are BIG summits, especially when one chooses a starting point at only 60m ASL, and I should have only selected one to do. First target was Yr Aran, and I had been advised to look out for a more gradual ascent leading off from the left and saving about 1km from the marked path. On this point we struggled badly, and exhausted much time and energy trying to pick the correct way up to the ridge and getting pretty well nowhere. Time was now cracking on, and we really needed to forget Yr Aran and just make Snowdon and get lunch and a train down to where the car had been left (Roger MW0IDX had kindly given us a lift from Llanberis to our walk start).  By the time we had got back to the Snowdon path, it was appropriate to forget the expedition altogether, and we walked back down the Watkin Path to the road, and hitched back to Llanberis.