Scrambling and Psychology

Enjoy an exhilarating weekend scrambling some of Snowdonia’s most iconic, rugged ridges and receive specialist psychological performance coaching to improve your mental focus for more challenging routes.
Scrambling is the cross-over between hillwalking and climbing, where the route gets steep and craggy, requiring the use of your hands as well as feet. Scrambling gives walkers access to varied and advanced terrain, including superb ridge walks with vast views on either side, opening up a whole new world and enabling walkers to reach quieter, less accessible paths.
This weekend is designed to give you the psychological skills and practical experience to feel fully confident in this environment, and in other challenging situations that may crop up as you develop as a hillwalker and explorer. This weekend is intended for people who regularly like to go outdoors and want to increase their confidence on steep and exposed terrain.
A specialist performance coach (a dual-qualified clinical psychologist and climbing instructor) will teach you cognitive behavioural techniques, mindfulness skills, and relaxation methods to help you develop your mental focus, overcome fears and anxieties, and increase motivation, to equip you for more sizeable challenges. Experienced mountain leaders will then take you through increasingly technical scrambles to allow you to put your new skills into practice.
Snowdonia is a great location for a scrambling weekend, as it offers a wide range of scrambles from gullies to exposed ridges, with many finishing on or close to summits. Routes will be chosen on the day to suit the weather and the group, but could include the North Ridge of Tryfan, Crib Goch or Y Gribin, alongside some lesser known rocky ridges. These routes are grade 1 scrambles, putting them within the reach of adventurous hillwalkers with average fitness.

Day 1

Your host will meet you at the bunkhouse where you’ll meet the rest of the group, and settle down for the night. Dinner on the first night is not included as people tend to arrive at different times, but there are pubs nearby and some self-catering facilities on site.

Day 2

Breakfast will be served at the bunkhouse’s on-site rustic cafe. A highly-experienced psychological performance coach will join you to deliver a talk to introduce the cognitive behavioural techniques, mindfulness skills, and relaxation methods that will help you develop mental strength as a hillwalker and explorer. You’ll then walk to a nearby location for some roped climbing, sprints, and hill reps to simulate different challenging situations that each require different facets of mental strength. You’ll head to a nearby cafe for a spot of lunch, before jumping into a minibus and venturing out for a full afternoon of scrambling to test what you’ve learned in a real environment. A hearty dinner will be served when you return - back at the bunkhouse cafe.

Day 3

On Sunday morning, after breakfast, you’ll head out for a full day of scrambling up one of the areas fantastic routes. This could be a guided traverse of the classic Crib Goch or the North Ridge of Tryfan North Ridge, depending on weather and group confidence levels. You’ll return to the bunkhouse for 4pm at the latest, to allow you to travel home before the weekend is over.