Llwybr Llechi Eryri, the Snowdonia Slate Trail, is one of the youngest of Wales’s long-distance walks, and one of the best. It had its origins in Unesco’s 2021 designation of the main slate areas of north-west Wales as a World Heritage Site. Aled Owen and colleagues at the Cwm [Penmachno] Community Action Group planned the Trail as a way of stimulating the local economy and helping visitors appreciate the rich heritage of the slate industry and its communities. Most of the route lies within the Eryri National Park, except the start and one of the Trail’s highlights, Blaenau Ffestiniog.
The route, 83 miles in length, begins in Bangor. The first stage leads to Bethesda, from which you walk in an anticlockwise loop back to Bethesda, via Llanberis, Beddgelert, Blaenau Ffestiniog, Llan Ffestiniog, Penmachno and Capel Curig. In effect you’re making a circuit of the mountains of Eryri, without the need to climb them. That’s not to say that it isn’t strenuous. For example, the section from Llan Ffestiniog to Penmachno is long and involves two or three chunky climbs. But a lot depends on how long you choose each stage to be. The official website breaks the Trail into thirteen sections, the guidebook suggests seven, and we took nine days in all, half in August 2025 (I had to skip the first day), the other half in April 2026 .
The Trail visits towns and villages that more conventional visitors frequent, but for the most part it sticks to paths where you’ll come across few people: we saw just two other groups of Trail walkers. There’s some tarmac walking, but almost all of the Trail is on footpaths far from roads and crowds. You’ll need good boots and nimble feet: the going can be rocky and boggy. The mountains of north-west Wales are more than usually rainy, so good waterproofs are a must.
You’ll find accommodation and food along the way, though the section between Llan Ffestiniog and Penmachno is mountainous and lonely, so take snacks and plenty of water. Phone reception is quite good, but beware of the area around Cwm Penmachno, which has none. We used Celtic Trails to arrange our accommodation and luggage transport.
Navigation is generally easy, with the help of good signposting, an excellent guidebook and the Ordnance Survey app, which marks the Trail route. Of course, that didn’t stop us from going astray at times, mainly thanks to carelessness and overconfidence, but sometimes because of an absence of signposts at a critical moment.
Slate is inescapable. You’ll see evidence of the slate industry almost everywhere, on every day except one. If you’re only familiar with the giant quarries, like Dinorwig or Penrhyn, you’ll be amazed at the number of much smaller ones, scattered on the high, inhospitable slopes of the mountains. What’s more, whereas in the south Wales coalfield there’s not much evidence left of the pits and their workings, and many of the tips have vanished, in the slate areas the great quarry holes, machinery and tips are still there, almost in the state in which they were abandoned. It takes little imagination to imagine the harsh and dangerous lives of the quarrymen, spent high in the mountains and far from the comforts of conventional society.
The Trail has many highlights. For me they include the quarry hospital at Llanberis, the skeletal slate machinery at Y Fron, Poblado Coffi in the quarrymen’s barracks at Nantlle, the rocky path along Abergalslyn Pass, the astonishing quarries at Rhosydd and Rhiwbach, and the cuckoos of Nant Ffrancon.
There’s just one guidebook to the Trail: Aled Owen, Snowdonia Slate Trail, 2nd ed., Edinburgh: Rucksack Readers, 2018. Its directions are detailed and accurate and its maps are helpful, without replacing the need to use OS maps. The cover’s claim to be ‘rainproof’ is sound. My copy was drenched twice by rain and, though its pages are now warped, crinkly and unglued, it survived. And so did we. Our memories of the Slate Trail will live with us.
The Snowdonia Slate Trail day by day
Day 1: Bethesda to Llanberis
Thursday 28 August 2025
Day 2: Llanberis to Y Fron
Friday 29 August 2025
Day 3: Y Fron to Beddgelert
Saturday 30 August 2025
Day 4: Beddgelert to Tanygrisiau
Sunday 31 August 2025
Day 5: Tanygrisiau to Llan Ffestiniog
Tuesday 28 April 2026
Day 6: Llan Ffestiniog to Penmachno
Wednesday 29 April 2026
Day 7: Penmachno to Capel Curig
Thursday 30 April 2026
Day 8: Capel Curig to Bethesda
Friday 1 May 2026
