Main Wall & Gambit Climb,
Diffwys Ddu (Cyrn Las) & Clogwyn y Ddysgl, North Wales

April 2008

Regular client and friend Simon decided he wanted to celebrate his 40th birthday in style - he couldn't think of anything and so booked me for a couple of days instead! The plan was to have a day of rock climbing with just the two of us and then a day of easier climbing or scrambling with his wife Claire joining us. Originally we had planned an overnight bivvy as well but this got binned with a wet night forecast.

We decided to climb Main Wall in Diffwys Ddu and then walk across to Gambit Climb.
Main Wall is a 6 pitch Hard Severe that climbs through some outrageous mountain architecture and has some truly awesome settings. Check out Simon on the hanging belay! There are one or two places where you have to look down at your feet and all you see is a big, big drop! The route encompasses all manners of climbing from well worn slab to exposed arete and is the easiest line on the crag so takes in some steep ground.

The sun was shining all day giving us the warmest day of the year so far so once we had topped out we headed upto the Clogwyn-y-Person Arete and climbed Gambit Climb. This is a 5 pitch Severe that is described in the guidebook as the best easy climb in North Wales! The route leads nicely to the arete of Clogwyn Y Person and we then scrambled across the ridge of Crib Y Ddysgl and back down for beer!

The photos are shown below.