Hafod Eryri also known as the Snowdon Summit Visitor Centre is, perhaps unsurprisingly, the highest visitor centre in the UK and attracts around half a million visitors every year arriving by foot or on the Snowdon Mountain Railway.

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Built to withstand the mountain weather conditions, the current building is in fact the third such to be in place atop Snowdon. The summit cafe sells refreshments and snacks and the gift shop has a range of souvenirs. You can even send a postcard from the summit post box.

The visitor centre is operated by Snowdon Mountain Railway and is usually open from late Spring until the last weekend in October but is closed on bad weather days. It opens at 10am daily and closes 20 minutes before the last train departs from the summit.

There are recordings of stone cairns and shelters appearing on the summit of Snowdon as early as the 1600’s however the first summit ‘building’ of any substance came in the early 19th century when local guides built a ‘hotel’ which would allow people to stay overnight and watch the sunrise the next morning. These wooden huts grew through the 1850’s taking over much of the summit area until in the 1930’s they were removed to make way for the first summit building designed by Sir Clough Williams-Ellis, the creator or Portmeirion.