TeamRAB Complete Welsh Three Peaks Charity Challenge

Earlier this month we posted about our latest charity challenge which involved climbing the Welsh Three Peaks in aid of the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC): https://rabconsultants.co.uk/news/teamrab-ready-for-welsh-three-peaks-charity-challenge/

Well now we’ve done it! A fantastic effort by all ten of TeamRAB. Below is a report of the challenge written by RAB Senior Engineer, Peter Batty. Lots of pics at the ending of the article too. And we are leaving the JustGiving page open for a while longer to increase the donation total for the Disasters Emergency Committee: https://www.justgiving.com/team/rabconsultants-welshpeakschallenge

Reservoir Tour:

One car setting off in luxury from Milton Keynes with only Dan, Joe and Zach on board. The other setting off from the Midlands collecting people as we went, ending up in less luxurious conditions with the car stacked seven bodies high (Al, Charlie, George, Josh, Rob, Tom and myself) and countless bags, including the largest, Charlie’s snacks!

We were given an excellent tour by Noel Hughes, from Severn Trent, into the history, construction, and inner workings of Clywedog Dam, which regulates flow in the River Severn and supports the drinking water in the West Midlands. A very impressive structure, that only very few get the opportunity to experience in the way we did.

Following the tour, we spread people between the cars making things much more comfortable and headed up towards Snowdon for some dinner, drinks and quite a few games of pool. Some people more worried about the early start than others.

The Climb:

A 4am start saw us setting off up Snowdon in the dark with head torches. Worth it for the spectacular sunrise just before we made the summit. We were up and down ahead of schedule and headed off to Cadair Idris, 45 minutes away.

Turns out 45 minutes is not long enough for your legs to recover from 5 hours walking up Snowdon. The selected route up was particularly tough consisting almost exclusively of steps and loose rocky scrambles. After conquering the steps and scrambles, we thought we were approaching the summit, however we were confronted with the soul-destroying realisation that it was a false summit and there was a short downhill section leading to yet more steps and scrambles! Some choice words were uttered at Josh for his route selection. Luckily, the route down was much less taxing.

Onto the next and final climb, Pen y Fan, luckily a much easier ascent. Head torches required again to reach the summit, and for some of us with now ruined knees, a very slow descent. This did allow the mountain goat that is Tom to have a nap back at the cars whilst he waited for us! Everyone was back down at the cars for 11pm.

60,000 steps, 2350 vertical meters and 19 hours later we had completed the Welsh 3 Peaks! Some saying they could do it all over, some saying never again and everyone else somewhere in between. A fantastic effort by everyone and a real achievement to be proud of.