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Wow! Well I wasn't expecting that!
A very busy summer's Saturday in the Snowdonia National Park found my wife Liz and I struggling to find anywhere to park in any of the more well known beauty spots where we usually stop to take a hike.
So almost as a last resort we took the single track road up from Llyn Pardarn to the huge abandoned slate quarry at Dinorwig, on the opposite side of the Pass of Llanberis to the town itself, and decided to explore what we thought would be a landscape devastated by industry.
As we hiked along the path between the fenced off quarry workings we certainly passed a lot of derelict and decaying buildings, eerily lovely in their desolation, and we eventually came to a spur off the path that led to a viewpoint high above the valley below.
Deciding to stop for a rest and a bite to eat, we took the spur to see what the view from the end was like.
Well, all thoughts of food vanished from my mind as we were confronted with this stunning scene, an uninterrupted view through a full 180°, taking in the complete Pass of Llanberis, lit by a patchwork of light and shadow as the sun played hide and seek with the dramatic clouds overhead.
No time to eat when there's a view like this to photograph!
I knew that to capture the full magnificence of the view I would need to make a panoramic collage comprising multiple frames, as no single image could convey the jaw dropping view Liz and I were enjoying.
So while Liz started on the picnic, I carefully set up camera and tripod in order to take the dozen or so overlapping exposures needed to capture the full view, keeping everything as level as possible so as not to induce distortions that would compromise the final assembled composition.
Adobe Lightroom did a fine job of stitching together the individual frames into this panorama, which I finished off in Photoshop to bring out the drama of the scene.
For those who are unfamiliar with the geography of this beautiful area of North Wales, I'll just walk you through the view from left to right, to explain what you're looking at.
At the far left of the image we have the abandoned workings of the Dinorwig slate quarry, sweeping down to the waters of Llyn Peris which is part of a pumped hydro-electric scheme called Electric Mountain.
Looking up from the quarry, across the other side of the Pass of Llanberis, we see the cloud capped peak of Snowdon and its horseshoe ridge, up which the Snowdon Mountain Railway winds its way from the town of Llanberis in the valley below.
In between the two lakes, Llyn Peris on the left and Llyn Padarn on the right, lie the ruins of Dolbadarn castle on its grassy knoll, just about visible in this panorama.
Continuing to the right is the market town of Llanberis, on the shores of the beautiful Llyn Padarn, which completes this view as the scene moves out towards the coast at Caernarfon.
I'm very, very, glad we made the effort to come to the Dinorwig quarry, and didn't just give up when the more popular Snowdonia beauty spots were full up.
And yes, I did eventually get something to eat!
Filename - llanberis panorama 01.jpg
Camera - Canon 6D
Lens - 24-105mm zoom @ 28mm
Exposure - 1/50 sec @ f11, ISO100
Filters - 2 stop neutral density graduated filter used to darken the sky
Location - Dinorwig Slate Quarry, Snowdonia, North Wales
This image - 1200x357px JPEG
Conversion - Adobe Lightroom and PhotoShop CC
Comments - Panoramic image made by stitching multiple exposures
All content copyright © Howard Litherland 2009-2026 unless otherwise stated.