A ydym yn oes eto?/Are we there yet? (Adventure Weekend in Wales)

Last weekend was Adventure weekend for all of us in the Butler Program, and they took us to Wales for the weekend. The weekend began with a bus trip departing London at 9 am. But the bus was late getting there and we didn't end up leaving until 9:30 am. We were supposed to get to the hotel around 3 pm, but because the driver made a wrong turn (or more like missed the correct one), and we finally arrived at the hotel around 5 pm.

After dinner that night, we had a pub quiz. At dinner we had divided into to teams, but we had not settled on a name for our team. We finally settled on "Spotted Dick" in honor of the desert we all had at dinner the first night here in England. Each round was a certain category, "Entertainment", "Sports & Leisure", "History, Art, & Literature", "Geography","General Knowledge", "Science & Nature", and a picture round. After all the scores were tallied, we came in second behind the IFSA staff, who always drop out before the final sudden-death round, so basically we were in first.

But there was one final round. The way this round worked was the first and second place teams sent two people up and they would answer questions and the last team with someone standing would win. Trouble is there was a 3 way tie for second, and they ran out of questions with 3 teams remaining. What to do? The staff decided that the winner would be decided who could guess the height of Mount Snowdon, the highest peak in Wales and right next to the hotel. When all was said and done, Spotted Dick was all of 29 feet off (actual height: 3,560 feet), and were declared winners, taking home the prize of a giant jar of chocolate.

The next day was the main event of Adventure weekend. We had to sign up for either a morning and an afternoon activity (go karts, half day hike, mountain biking, canoeing, high ropes, or low ropes) or do the full day hike to the top of Mount Snowdon. I opted for the full day hike. As I was tying the boots they provided (for which I am very grateful), I found out that we would in fact not be going up Mount Snowdon, because it was living up to its name. There was too much snow. But we did up seeing a lot of sheep during the day:We did go up Moel Eilio, which was a lower peak in Snowdonia National Park at a mere 2,382 feet. It was painful hiking up the mountain and I am just now recovering from the soreness in my legs. All I can say is that I am thankful we did not do Snowdon. It was a fairly clear day, but on a really clear day you can actually see the Irish coast from the top of Moel Eilio.
An abandoned slate mine:And Mount Snowdon itself:That night Butler threw a party for everyone, which was a lot of fun. The main event on Sunday a trip to Llandudno, a beautiful seaside town with an impressive beach. Here are a couple of pictures: