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Glyder Fach

If you were to blindfold me and place me at random on any of the 170-odd peaks in Wales that exceed 2000ft, it would probably take me a little while to discover my whereabouts. Unless it were either of the Glyders that is, for they are unique, incomparable, unlike anywhere else in Wales!

Glyder Fawr and Glyder Fach mean ‘Great Pile’ and ‘Little Pile’ respectively, though there is little to choose between them. Glyder Fach is, if anything, the more rugged peak – a wild, chaotic plateau of gesticulating boulders crowned with two mighty tors. Glyder Fawr is marginally tamer; no less dramatic, yet very different. Its vast stony dome, littered with leafy, spiky quivers of rock, recalls the tor country of the NW Carneddau and has a curious beehive appearance when approached from Glyder Fach. In mist, or moonlight, both tops generate a weird, eerie atmosphere as their huge monoliths pierce the gloom.

To tramp the lofty tableland between these two giants is a unique experience. So let me give you a brief guided tour starting from 659584 which is where the top of Bristly Ridge and the path from Llyn y Caseg-fraith both mount the plateau. A cairned path is just discernible, steering a course on 230° through the rocky debris. It passes N of one massive pile (on the W side of which is the famous cantilever) before skirting N of a second even larger pile which is the (cairnless) top. It becomes difficult here to distinguish the cairns from the all-pervading bouldery waste, so follow the tell-tale sign of eroded, reddish sand until the cairns reassert themselves.