Crib Goch
— — the ridge that asks both hands.
Not only on a wall.
“A knife-edge arête on the northern arm of the Snowdon Horseshoe, in Eryri National Park. From the Pen-y-Pass car park, the path climbs about six hundred metres to a ridge that narrows to a true scramble — Grade 1, exposed both sides, with the Llanberis Pass falling away to the north and Cwm Glas to the south. On a clear day the line of pinnacles runs all the way to Garnedd Ugain and the summit of Yr Wyddfa. On a wet day it is a different mountain.
Crib Goch, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
Crib Goch (Welsh for 'red ridge') is a knife-edge arête on the northern side of the Snowdon massif in Eryri National Park, Gwynedd, north Wales. Its highest point reaches 923 metres, making it a Welsh 3000 in its own right. It forms the first leg of the classic Snowdon Horseshoe traverse, which continues over Garnedd Ugain to the summit of Yr Wyddfa at 1,085 metres and back along Y Lliwedd. The standard approach is from the Pen-y-Pass car park on the A4086 above the Llanberis Pass.
The ridge is a Grade 1 scramble — the easiest grade in the British system, but with serious consequences. Crib Goch has the highest fatality rate of any mountain route in Snowdonia, and mountain rescue logs it among the busiest call-outs in Wales. The exposure is two-sided across roughly half a kilometre of crest; in wind above about thirty miles an hour the ridge is regarded as unjustifiable. Winter conditions promote the route to a serious mountaineering objective with axe and crampons. Most parties take three to four hours from Pen-y-Pass to the Yr Wyddfa summit.
The ridge is built from Ordovician volcanic rock — chiefly rhyolitic tuff laid down about 450 million years ago during the eruptive arc that formed much of the Snowdon massif. The red tint that gives Crib Goch its name comes from oxidised iron in the rock, most visible in low afternoon light. The pinnacles at the eastern end of the crest are the most photographed feature of the Horseshoe; from the top of the ridge the Glaslyn cwm opens to the south, with Llyn Llydaw catching the light below the Y Lliwedd face.