Tag: Arenig Fawr

Arenig Fawr SOTA Activation

Summits On The Air reference GW/NW-011, 8 points

Activity Summary

  • Date : 22nd March 2026
  • Distance : 8.19 km
  • Ascent : 549 m
  • Max Altitude : 854 m
  • Time to Summit : 1:54 hrs
  • Total Activation Time : 5:57 hrs

Weather

  • Cloudy / Hazy
  • Temperature 7 ℃
  • Feels like 7 ℃
  • Humidity 73%
  • Wind Speed 4 km/h
  • Wind Direction WSW

Equipment Used

  • Icom IC705 (10w)
  • 2m Flowerpot antenna (homebrew)
  • 20m 1/4 wave telescopic ground plane antenna
  • SOTABEAMS Carbon 6 pole
  • PoLo logging app on iPad mini

Parking Location What3Words

///flop.revives.multiple

Activation Report

I had been looking forward to activating Arenig Fawr on a day with good weather, as for my last two attempts the weather hadn’t been great. It was 9 am when I arrived at the parking spot, located at SH 82260 39266. The weather was a fine spring morning, sunny although fresh. The parking spot is at the start of a farm track that runs along side the now disused Bala and Festiniog railway. There is room for two cars to tuck in either side of the track leaving plenty of room for access.

I set off up the track at about 9:20 am, I soon arrived at the point where the route leaves the track. I have previously seen the area around the gate here completely flooded, and so I was glad to see that it was easily passable this time. The first section as you leave the track is a bit boggy, but once some height is gained the ground becomes dry under foot.

The route heads left in the picture, following the wall from the nearside

Once you leave the track, there is no noticeable path as such. Sometimes you can see a faint path, or animal runs that seem to logically circumnavigate some of the steeper sections. Once the 710 metre contour line is reached there is a short rocky section. This marks the end of the steeper climb, as once above this section it becomes a gentle climb to the summit.

The last bit of steep climbing

The summit is marked by a trig pillar and a summit shelter. On a wall in the shelter is a memorial to the eight men that had lost their lives on the 4th August 1943. They were the crew an American B19 flying fortress bomber that crashed on the summit.

The memorial on the summit.

I took a moment of contemplation before turning my attention to the views, although it was hazy the views were still magnificent.

I was in no rush to get off the summit on such a glorious day. I setup my station a few metres from the summit shelter, and then sat on a rock to enjoy a cup of coffee and a flapjack before getting down to business.

I was using the IC705 running 10w, I started on 2m SSB with a vertical flowerpot antenna. I soon had five contacts in the log and after a short stint on FM, I returned to bag seven more SSB contacts. After an hour on 2m, I swapped to 20m, using the quarter wave telescopic ground plane antenna. 20m conditions were not great, but still managed nine more contacts, including three summit to summit contacts. I switched back to 2m SSB for one last time and managed another four contacts including a S2S to Northern Ireland. This had given me a total of sixteen, 2m SSB contacts. I had logged a total of 7 summit to summit contacts for the day. See the summary activation summery below. This report is automatically generated by the PoLo logging software.

Activation Summary
QSO Map

I had a really enjoyable activation, the good weather makes such a difference. I headed back down the same way that I had ascended, although I did try and avoid the boggy section just before the track.

The view from my activating position

The interactive map below shows a track of the route taken. You can zoom in or out to change the scale. The map can also be shown in full screen. The GPX track can also be downloaded using the link below the map.

Download file for GPS

Further information can be found on the SOTA resource page for the summit