All language subtitles for 1 1 The.Worlds.Most.Beautiful.Landscapes.S01E01.480p

Right across our planet, there is an
incredible variety of astonishing

landscapes.

One of the most beautiful anywhere in
the world is

Snowdonia.

Snowdonia in North Wales is an almost
miraculous haven of tranquility.

What's not to like? It's a magical
place. It's like being in a fairy tale

all these trees dripping with mosses and
lichens. And every time you come here,

you see a different aspect of it. It's
fantastic.

It has nine mountain ranges with an
extraordinary geological history.

The mountains just bring so much
richness to life.

you can spend a lot of time just walking
it changes your perspective of daily

life completely it has no fewer than 250
lakes it has rare

wildlife and a rich human history
stretching back thousands of years

you've got the wildlife you've got the
cultural history you've got so much

intermingled into this one place it's so
special and it's ever changing we're

going to take you on a journey through
snowdonia to admire its wonders and

discover its secrets.

Our journey begins by the Irish Sea,
gliding over Cardigan Bay and along the

long, sandy beaches near Harlech.

At Morfa Harlech, Welsh for salt marsh,
these beaches form a line of sand

stretching 10 kilometres along the
coast.

These sand dunes are growing, constantly
added to from sands blown north.

The dunes are a nature reserve.

As the sands gather, the marram grass
takes hold.

This is home for an amazing array of
plants and insects.

Bird life is abundant too, including the
ringed plover, nesting on the beach

from March each year.

Skylarks and stonechats breed in the
dunes.

Sixty metres high, on a spur of rock,
sits Harlech's medieval castle.

In 1284, when the English King Edward I
built Harlech Castle, it was right

beside the sea.

But the landmass is shifting.

It's going upwards.

and, over the centuries, is rising
further away from the sea.

Journeying up the beaches from the
castle is an estuary where the rivers

and Dewey Red meet.

Parts of this salt marsh and sandy bay
can be completely submerged under water,

but with the tide out, sand and marsh
stretch far out towards the sea.

The bay features villages and towns like
Porthmadoc, once famous for exporting

slate.

But there's a village here unlike any
other in Snowdonia.

Port Merion.

The brainchild of visionary Welsh
architect Sir Clough Williams Ellis.

This town is a homage to the Italian
Mediterranean.

It was his way of stating the beauty of
the Snowdonian coastline.

Started in 1925, Port Merion took 50
years to complete.

Writers and artists... have flocked
here, but it's most famed as the setting

the 1960s cult TV series, The Prisoner.

Travelling five kilometres northeast of
Port Merion's man -made wonder, we're

dropping in on Coed Felon Reed, a much
earthier Snowdonian secret.

Britain has many woods, but this is
different.

Name -checked in the Mabinogion, the
legendary 12th century folktale, Cowid

Felon Reed is part of a 750 -acre
woodland survival story.

But it escaped destruction by the skin
of its teeth.

Felled for centuries.

The chopping stopped just in time to
leave us with a rich part of what is

as the Celtic rainforest.

In this patch of forest, it can rain 200
days a year.

And this damp, temperate microclimate in
a gorge provides perfect conditions for

an extraordinary array of life that
lives on the trees themselves.

With the woods' humidity and protection
from acid rain, these trees are a

snapshot of ancient woodland from
centuries ago.

And the person in charge of nursing
these woods back to their full glory is

Kylie Jones -Matter.

What's not to like? It's a magical
place. It's got a sort of sense of

and all these... hidden gems that you
have to seek out it's like being in a

fairy tale with all these trees dripping
with mosses and lichens the sound of

rushing water and around every sort of
kink in the river there's a new little

vista there's just so much fascinating
and every time you come here you see a

different aspect of it and there are
still things to find even for people

been managing a wood for 10 years it's
fantastic

Kylie's job is to help replace the
conifers with trees like oaks and hazel,

which act as hosts for amazing ancient
life forms.

We're coming into one of the most
fascinating parts of the woods now.

The hazel here is a clue to the ancient
history of this woodland.

There are species here that occur
nowhere else in Wales, species of lichen

grow on the bare bark of the hazel. And
there are species that have been here

since the last ice age when trees first
colonised Britain.

And there's been obviously continuity in
the habitat here. They're ancient

woodlands, which means they've been
consistently wooded for...

a long period of time, several hundred
years.

But we think these woodlands go back a
really long way. If you look at the bark

of one of these hazels, you're looking
at a whole encrustation of different

lichens, all kind of overlapping and
butting up against one another. So what

think of as a hazel bark is a whole
community of other species, and that

survived because of the continuity of
the habitat in this ancient woodland.

The woods provide a home to 25 scarce
mosses and liverworts, 42 rare lichens

at least one very inventive fungus.

now this is a really cool thing this
unassuming black blob is a fungus called

hazel glue and it has a sneaky
competitive strategy to beat other fungi

meal normally this rotten hazel stick
would have fallen to the forest floor

where there would be hundreds if not
thousands of other fungi wanting to

to consume it and take all its nutrients
the hazel glue however

sticks these dead stems up in the
canopy, grips onto them so they can't

the floor, which means it can take its
leisurely time over eating up that dead

hazel and extracting all the food it
needs.

So, pretty nifty strategy.

Just like in the Amazon, the plants in
British forests have been used by people

for centuries.

I love this one.

This is a liverwort, this one.

called basania.

They don't have roots, and so they're
really dependent on the moisture from

atmosphere. And this particular species
is one that really needs an Atlantic

climate. The Celtic rainforest habitat
can't regulate its own moisture, so it

needs that constant humidity.

And I always think it looks a bit zany,
which is how I remember it.

Kylie's job is to manage the woodland
above ground.

But in doing so, she's doing something
almost more important.

There are some pretty large trees and
some ancient oaks, but it's not just the

age of the trees, it's the age of the
woodland itself.

So although many of the trees may be
young, they're growing in a place that

woodland ecosystem, and it has been for
hundreds of years.

So the big oak trees are perhaps what we
see, but underneath the ground there's

a whole...

woodland network of fungi and bacteria
of lichens of mosses and liverworts all

living together and forming together an
ecosystem that's incredibly rare and

very precious strange though it may seem
the biology of rare forest ecosystems

are now studied to see how their
connectivity and systems can be applied

technology i think Ancient woodlands are
a refuge for rare species

because there are so few ancient
woodlands left. We would have had masses

woodland cover and now just two or three
percent of the UK is covered in ancient

woodland. So these species are really
clinging on in the last refuges of

suitable habitat.

I think it's why I really love doing
what I do because you're protecting

last places where some of the rarest
things in Wales actually live.

And you're restoring them and you're
making them better and you're passing

on to future generations.

It's a great job.

With replanting and the right love and
attention, in a hundred years, this

Celtic winged forest will look a little
like how it did in ancient times.

Before heading for the mountains, we're
going out on a limb.

It's called the Hlyn Peninsula, known as
Snowdon's Arm.

Seen from space, it's a patchwork of
green fields ringed almost around with a

line of yellow sand.

Criccia, with its imposing castle,
guards the peninsula.

And it is thought the castle was built
in the early 13th century by Llywelyn

Great, king of Gwynedd and later ruler
of all Wales.

Later on, it was taken by the English,
but then seized by Welsh Prince Owen

Glendower and burned to the ground. The
ruins are what we see today.

It is not the only sight on the glen of
military significance.

The ancient Celtic hillfort of Trier
Cary is at 485 metres.

This is one of the highest hillforts in
Britain.

Trier Cary, or what some have translated
to Town of Giants, was built during the

Iron Age.

Up here are the remains of defences and
150 stone houses built by the Celts.

It is thought they had livestock, grew
their own food and had a fresh water

spring.

The Roman invasion was the beginning of
the end for many Celtic tribes, but not

this tribe.

Archaeological evidence suggests they
continued to live up on this mountain

winter after winter, for another 200
years after the Romans left.

Not many people live on the Hlyn
Peninsula.

and incredible wildlife rule the roost
here, the westernmost tip of the flint.

But there is one person living here who
knows it all very well.

Naturalist Ben Porter has been here
almost his whole life, and he's studied

living environment in detail.

I think it definitely forged a much
deeper connection with the landscape

you're into wildlife because you're able
to understand the sort of relationships

between the species and their habitats,
their landscapes, and all the

relationships and the sort of
intermingling of those becomes really,

clear.

There is a real satisfaction that comes
from it.

Ben's familiar with the comings and
goings of over 100 species of birds that

regularly visit, including a real rarity
in the British Isles.

So we've got some chuff just up ahead of
us. This is quite a special species for

the Thin Peninsula, the red -billed
chuff. It's a crow with a bright red

and red legs, and they forage in this
sort of environment with quite short

grass, often where there's been sheep
grazing and things, and they feed on.

on the larvae of beetles like dung
beetles that actually exist in sort of

pats and sheep dung as well and they
nest in sort of gullies and places

the cliff it's not long before ben spots
more amazing

examples of the wildlife that he's now
so familiar with right

now i'm looking at some small slots of
guillemots that are passing through

heading north and There's been a small
pod of porpoise just out there,

just now.

They often just surface a couple of
times and then they'll disappear for

ten minutes and you'll just see the
little rounded black backs as they sort

surface. But it's a brilliant spot for
looking out to sea and seeing all sort

manner of different seabirds passing by,
especially when you have a strong

onshore wind. They come quite close.

But come summer, you'll be in a really
good chance of seeing rissos dolphins,

which is a real speciality of the sort
of North Wales coast, the Slim

Brilliant for them, a quite scarce
species of cetacean. And they'll feed on

squid, cuttlefish and octopus on the
seabed.

Amazing cetaceans.

Ben's teenage years were spent on the
family farm just three kilometres away

from the tip of the Llyn.

It's just two and a half by one
kilometre wide and is called Bardsley

Unes En Clí in Welsh.

And he knows the visitors there very
well.

Particularly on Unessentially, which is
a really unique place for wildlife,

there's a specific species called the
Manx Shearwater, which is a sort of

-sized seabird that only comes ashore at
night, and it fills the air with this

really weird call that sailors used to
think was sort of a haunted spirit of

island.

But they're incredible seabirds. They
winter off South America, and they only

come to a scattering of islands around
the UK to breed.

And so that is one of them, and
essentially it's one of those places

,000 pairs that breed there. So you're
talking a lot of birds.

And that is a really special experience
to be able to see those, and you won't

get that anywhere else in North Wales.

The end of the Lynn may belong to the
wildlife and farms, but for hundreds of

years people have made their mark here.

in many ways there's so many different
layers of history around this area but

this is quite uh it's quite a
significant point in that the pilgrims

um as far as i believe went from sort of
hollywell and ended here or even on the

island this is the sort of the the
westernmost point where pilgrims would

and look out to unessentially before
potentially getting a boat out to the

island But beyond that, there's going to
be... There's Bronze Age settlements

around these hillsides and Iron Age and
there's Neolithic remnants in some

places as well. You know, it goes back,
you know, hundreds and hundreds of

years.

Away from the coast...

Snowdonia is also a land of lakes, 250
of them, visible from space

as black holes in the landscape.

The largest natural lake is Bala Lake,
Llyn Tegid in Welsh.

The name comes from Tegid Foyle, the
husband of Cerriwen, the enchantress in

Mabinogion folk tales.

Like most of Snowdonia's lakes, it was
formed during the Lappite Age.

But this lake is different.

At 6 kilometres long and 43 metres deep,
it sits on the Bala Fault Line,

a deep earth fracture.

The lake's a haven for birds, too.

Visitors like the black -throated diver
and the green sandpiper.

And it's a breeding ground for the great
crested grebe.

Having explored the natural wonders of
the Hlyn Peninsula and dipped into

Ballard's Lake, the next leg of our
journey takes us into the heart of

Snowdonia.

It's time to leave the lowlands and
start climbing.

We're going to the mountain ranges of
Snowdonia.

The power of this dramatic and magical
landscape is a huge draw to outsiders.

Every year, ten million people come to
pay homage to its grandeur. Many will

climb Snowdon and other mountains.

It wasn't always that way.

Back in 1188, famous adventurer Gerard
of Wales, as he travelled around looking

for recruits for the Crusades, gazed
fearfully at the mountains and said, The

mountains of snow seem to rear their
lofty summits even to the clouds when

viewed from the opposite coast from
Anglesey.

Yes, he'd heard tales of Snowdonia's
eagle perching on a stone, waiting to

on the bodies of dead men.

Fearing the worst, Gerald went around
the mountains.

He dared not go through them.

Seen from above, the contours of the
tightly packed mountains appear as a

of brown amid green farmland that
surrounds it.

Mount Snowdon gets the glory.

But many climbers prefer a lesser -known
peak.

It's thought the name Trevan comes from
the phrase three stones in ancient

Welsh.

Trevan's story starts 450 million years
ago with the clashing of the oceanic and

continental plates deep below the
Earth's surface.

As they crunch together...

immense energy -propelled volcanic rock
upwards to form the basis of Snowdonian

mountains like Trevan.

Trevan was originally five times higher
than it is today, but 250 million

years of weathering and recent
glaciation has reduced it.

At about 900 metres, it is by no means
the highest.

Even so, climbing it can be a big
challenge.

Scaling Trevan can be close to an
obsession for some.

That includes mountain leader, rescue
volunteer and Trevan expert, Paul Terry.

This is a mountain that just excites me.

There's something...

really unique about it in the place in
this valley and its place in snowdonia

because there's not another mountain
that's just so immediately accessible as

serious mountain but if you climb the
east face there that's currently

completely covered in ice and snow you
can be in proper mountaineering terrain

there are roots on there that extend up
to about 200 meters that you can climb

on a rope that you would imagine could
be anywhere in the alps or even other

mountain areas in the world but this is
just a big lump of rock that is it's

aggressive it's dramatic but also it's
really beautiful and there isn't another

mountain like it in this area

Then people come to climb it because
they get a real sense of achievement. If

they can get to the top of this
mountain, then they've done something.

The mountains just bring so much
richness to life.

And if you get a chance to come out
here, you can spend a lot of time just

walking. It changes your perspective of
daily life completely.

Paul Terry's love affair with Trevan
began when he came to study at Bangor

University just north of the mountains.

I started climbing this mountain about
20 years ago and back then I really

wasn't a very experienced hill walker
and it's the obvious choice of the

mountain when you get into this valley
you see it and it just draws you in. I

remember walking up there with a really
good friend of mine early on in my

walking days and just feeling this most
incredible sense of adventure because up

there everything changes. There's
nothing like it is down in the valley.

There was a time that I climbed it in
these conditions at night.

It was such an intense experience being
up there, not being able to see anything

around you except for the snow and the
rocks, and the silence as well which

comes when you have everything coated
with snow and ice.

It just makes for such an incredible
adventure. I think that's what makes

mountain so exciting.

Paul's walked and climbed up Trevan day
and night, winter and summer, and by

many different routes to the summit.

What people really love about this
mountain is the North Ridge, and the

Ridge is starting down in the meadows
below and moving up from 300 metres up

900 metres on the summit.

The amazing thing is it's right next to
a road and you can get straight onto

there. The only problem is that brings
people here and the expectation that

might be able to climb it and quite
often they come unstuck and end up

calling for a little bit of help.

there's another group of accomplished
climbers in these parts.

A species with thousands of years of
mountain experience.

Snowdonia's extraordinary wild goat.

Known as primitive, it's believed that
some of a direct line of descent to

introduced here by Neolithic farmers 5
,000 years ago.

They were kept for milk, meat, hair, and
horn.

Even 200 years ago, numerous herds of
wild goats roamed this landscape.

Now, there are only about 1 ,000
individuals.

Today, these goats are free to eat the
grasses on high slopes, something the

less nimble sheep would be unwise to
try.

Just a short walk from the challenge of
Trevan is one of the other great

features of the Ogwen Valley.

The Welsh word Cwm means valley.

It became the first Welsh nature reserve
over 60 years ago and has been ranked

among Britain's ten greatest natural
wonders.

This is Cwm Ydwel, and this is one of
the most amazing geological areas of

Snowdonia and of the UK, and it's really
significant.

in terms of the history of geology,
because it's an absolutely incredible

and mishmash of different geological
histories.

This used to be an ocean floor, then
covered over with different generations

volcanic eruptive material.

It just got folded and melted and
exploded until we get what is probably

the most amazing mountain sceneries in
the UK.

It's also a landscape of groundbreaking
geological discovery.

Charles Darwin came to Combe -et -Val
twice.

Here in 1831, he realized that the
boulders around the lake containing

of marine seashells were once part of an
ancient ocean deep below.

And the boulders, therefore, must have
been raised to the surface by huge

in the Earth's crust.

Returning to Idval years later, Darwin
realized for the first time that the

entire landscape must also have been
sculpted by giant glaciers.

These boulders here, particularly...

In this grouping where you've got two
massive ones that have been cleaved

are what's known as erratics.

And what's really interesting about this
is that 10 ,000 years ago, about the

last ice age that we had, this whole
valley, this cumb, was filled with ice

bottom to top, and it's just left now
with a shallow lake.

And boulders like this were dragged off
the mountainside and dragged off the

cliff and scooped up by the glacier
either in the ice or under the ice.

and then left here once the ice
disappeared.

Paul's growing fascination with the
geology has fueled his passion to keep

walking and climbing Snowdonia.

It's dramatic, it's beautiful, and a
really amazing route is actually walking

from this really lovely glacial lake,
Thin Idwell.

and walking up the rock fall in the back
corner and coming out over the top onto

a plateau and for me it's really
reminiscent of the kind of features that

see in the lord of the rings films
really dramatic and incredible scenery

before

going to mount snowden itself we're
traveling north to the spectacular Abba

Falls.

In the Karnaval Mountains, one of
Snowdonia's nine mountain ranges is Abba

Falls, known as Haredavao.

Here, the avant -goc, or river -goc,
plunges 37 meters into the valley below.

It's a haven for nature, too.

The spray from the falls creates perfect
conditions for plants like wild

angelica.

Looking up, peregrine falcons and ravens
can be seen floating above.

Around 4 ,000 years ago in Neolithic
times, some of the first farmers in

Snowdonia were here.

There are over 1 ,000 farms in
Snowdonia.

The hilly terrain suits one animal above
others.

There are more than 3

million of them here.

The best Welsh mountain sheep are hardy
and good mothers.

Their lambs have adapted to survive the
harsh weather.

Sheep are partly responsible for the way
Snowdonia looks.

Without grazing, the lower mountain
slopes will be covered in forest.

Travelling just seven kilometres west of
Trevann and the Ogden Valley, we arrive

at a mountain called Elidavar.

Here are the dramatic remains of human
interaction with the natural landscape.

This was the second largest slate quarry
in Britain and it was called Dinorvik.

It's believed the name means Fort of the
Ordoviches.

a Celtic tribe.

The slate mine here is big enough to
appear as a little slate gray zone when

seen from space.

Once, 3 ,000 men were employed at this
site, producing tens of thousands of

of slate each year.

But the quarry closed 50 years ago.

It wasn't the end of the story for
Elodea, which will be put to use in

way entirely.

There are two lakes here, one high on
the mountain, one at the base, and the

interior of the mountain is hollowed
out, cavernous after hundreds of years

quarrying.

All this makes perfect conditions for a
power station using water from the high

lake to drive turbines in the caverns as
the water drops to the lower lake.

Out of the old technology comes the new.

Hill fort, slate quarry and now power
station. And all in one

mountain.

Across the valley and just eight
kilometers south of Elodea is Mount

itself.

Despite the human visitors, the mountain
and its surrounds provides a home to

some incredible rare species of flora
and fauna.

You might see the Ring Oozle around
here.

a rare white -collared blackbird that is
staging a comeback.

And, if you look carefully on Mount
Snowdon, you can find a delicate flower

blooming in May and June, otherwise
found far away in the Alps.

The beautiful Snowdon lily has a
foothold.

With its peak at 1 ,085 meters, Snowdon
is the highest mountain in England and

Wales.

In Welsh, Snowdon was once called Urbit
Vyvar, the Great Tomb, or

Caernathacar, the Cairn of the Giant.

All these names speak of a land steeped
in history and legends.

And Snowdon, like Halidafar, is a
mountain that's had its uses.

Copper ore was found in Snowdon and
mining began around the early 1800s.

Once mined, getting the copper out of
the mountains was expensive and

Paths were built for the miners.

And 100 years after the mines closed,
these paths are still used today by most

of the 500 ,000 people each year headed
for Snowdon Summit.

Two paths start at the same place, Penny
Pass.

One of the most popular is still called
the Miner's Track.

Another harder route, also a miner's
route, is the Pig Track.

But the Watkin Path, which opened nearly
130 years ago, is the first designated

footpath in Britain.

There's an easier way to the top of
Snowdon.

The train.

Near the ruins of Dolberdan Castle is
the village of Cranberry.

Board a train here and you can reach the
top of Mount Snowdon one hour later.

In Snowdonia, in the industrial era,
narrow -gauge railways exploded.

The Snowdon Mountain Railway was
completed in 1896.

It catered for those Victorians who
didn't want the struggle of walking to

summit.

There are majestic views as the Swiss
-built engines heave their way up nearly

eight kilometres to the top.

And along the route are reminders of the
epic volcanic story of Snowdonia's

beginnings.

Still popular today, every year in the
summer months, over 100 ,000 people

the summit this way.

But there's one person who you won't
find taking the mountain railway.

Author Paul Gannon has spent half a
century getting to know Snowdon

inside and out.

You know, what I really love about
getting up high in these mountains is

views you get looking down on the world
below you and observing the nature, the

shape of the mountains and all the
things you can see. When we were down

everything looked so big. From up here,
everything looked so small.

You feel as if you're on top of the
world. It's fantastic.

I think it's because I have studied the
geology that I find the shape so

interesting to understand what on earth
made these mountains, what on earth made

them the shapes they are. So incredible.

And how on earth did these billions upon
billions of tons of rock get thrust up

from the ground to a kilometre or two
kilometres or more above sea level?

We really want to know why and how that
happened.

On the summit of Snowdon, literally just
below the summit cairn, you can find

fossils of sea creatures, brachiopods,
that were living in the sea 450 million

years ago when the volcanic eruptions
took place that created all these rocks.

So, 450 million years ago, the summit of
Snowdon...

now a kilometre above sea level, was
actually below sea level.

Features in the Snowdonian landscape
called sink lines show that the rocks

simply folded up at extreme heat.

But these extraordinary temperatures are
not possible anywhere near the Earth's

surface.

So what tells us, in fact, the summit of
Snowdon, during its lifetime, has been

drawn down to at least 12 kilometres
below the surface and now brought back

to a kilometre above the surface?

And Snowdonia's dramatic landscape has
proved irresistible to Paul, who has

lived here for a quarter of a century.

Having come from the flatlands of
England...

There's something completely different
about being in the mountains than there

is about being in the areas where the
land is all flat.

And I dare I say a little tedious.

One thing you can say is there's nothing
tedious about this landscape.

Mount Snowdon is a story of epic change
over many.

And it's a story about how the Welsh
people have lived in and used this

and rugged landscape for centuries.

One thing's for sure.

Snowdonia will always be one of the most
beautiful landscapes in the world.