In reply to fammer:
I had great fun on this route recently with three good friends.
The chaos of Pen-y-Pass, was the first trial. Not just the parking, nor simply the cost of it, but also some bored and lonely would-be hiker accosting us with interminable questions about the relative difficulties of Crib Goch. Finally escaping the pilgrimage swarms, we arrived late, having taken a scenic route to the crag. Stood at the bottom of the route, after a treacherous traverse scramble in, there were damp patches everywhere and we were only reasonably sure we were stood in the right place. Another team were a pitch above us...
We set off, noting the loose rock everywhere. I caught up with the team above us on the second pitch. I'd crossed one rib and started up an obvious groove/slab. "Don't come up this way," they bellowed down, "it's a dead end!" I down-climbed a few metres and spotted a traverse around a second rib - a good pitch, though the only gear was slings on spikes, with every second spike being loose. Eventually I saw an obvious spike belay and, studying the guide with my partner, surmised I was somewhere around pitch 2.5. She headed up to a ledge where the team above seemed to have camped for the night. The leader of that team, directly above me, exclaimed loudly about a rather large and pointy loose block he'd discovered and was now happily levering back and forth. "Don't throw that large pointy block at me, if you so please", I offered up politely.
Stuck behind this team, we waited an hour for them then climbed a nice patch of steep quartz, the only sound bit of rock on the entire route, with little gear, round some ribs. Above this, the rock finally accorded with the guide: "follow the vegetated groove," we read, looking up at some steep grass that gave way, eventually, to a further pitch of steep grass.
And lo, we'd reached the Red Wall and once again caught up with the team above.
With swirling masses of damp clag closing in around us, and the team above showing no signs of life beyond the occasional gesture toward the barest idea of movement, we decided to head up Terminal Arete. Little did we know, the adventure was just beginning. Now in trainers and serious rain, buffeted by the wind, the quartz groove guarding the start of this "scramble" became a death slide. Terrified into submission, we dropped our coils and wished only for salvation, pitching our way up the drenched rock, gripped out of our minds, yet elated, singing and shouting into the wind, close to madness, lost in the intimacy of our perverse enjoyment of the utter misery of it all.
The final challenge was finding a pub still serving after 9pm. This was certainly the closest call of the day, and the most nearly fatal.
A cracking day.
Post edited at 01:00