Pen-yr-Orsedd quarry

Nantlle (Welsh pronunciation) is a small village in the slate quarrying Nantlle Valley in Gwynedd, Wales. It lies on the north shore of Llyn Nantlle Uchaf and is part of the community of Llanllyfni. The population was 228 in 2011 with 42% born in England.

Y Fron, also known locally as Cesarea, after the chapel, is a country village on the south-west side of Moel Tryfan, overlooking the Nantlle Valley, in North Wales, near Rhosgadfan and Carmel, on the tail of Mynydd Mawr, with epic views of Trum Y Ddysgl and Craig Cwm Silyn. It is in the community of Llandwrog. During the 19th century (1890s) the nearby Moel Tryfan slate quarry was a significant local employer along with a few other quarries in the local area. During this time, Y Fron was home to a bustling community and had several commercial outlets; Butcher/Abattoir, General store, Shoe shop, Post Office, Bakers, Barber, Chip shop, furniture store. Although Moel Tryfan quarry is closer to Rhosgadfan, the railway track which carried slate to Slate Quay in the Royal town of Caernarfon passed through Y Fron and around to the area called "Drumhead" near Bryn; (the road between Y Fron and Rhosgadfan). Some of the slate waste heaps or Slag heaps that were left behind from hundreds of years of mining are now being put to use as materials for roads. In 2002 the Moel Tryfan quarry was used to film Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life. The village school, Ysgol Bronyfoel, was established in 1844 as the first school in the Nantlle Valley. It has a sloping football pitch and a small play park attached. The school closed its door for the last time in July 2015 after being open for a 171 Years. Supported by money from the Big Lottery and the Welsh Government, the local community has converted the former school into a Community Centre called Canolfan Y Fron complete with café, shop and bunk house. The historic 'Cesarea' Chapel was demolished in 2009. Capel Bwlch-Llyn is now the only surviving religious building left standing in the village. (There may have been 3-4 chapels here in the past) The village attracts many walkers throughout the year, who begin their venture towards Mynydd Mawr and eventually around Snowdonia and onto Trum Y Ddysgl and Craig Cwm Silyn. Annually, during the spring (April), Y Fron plays host to a small endurance race called Ras Mynydd Mawr; Big Mountain Race. The race begins, with registration at the local school, Ysgol Bronyfoel and continues to the peak of Mynydd Mawr, which is approximately 3.75 miles, raising 1500'.

Ysgol Bronyfoel was a Welsh daily co-educational primary school. The school was situated in the centre of the village Y Fron, Gwynedd, North Wales. It opened in 1844 and was greatly enlarged at the end of the 19th century. It was a vibrant and successful school for 171 years. The school suffered from declining numbers of pupils from 1990 onwards and was permanently closed in July 2015. Primary pupils now attend Ysgol Bro Llifon in the village of Groeslon 3 miles away. The school building has been turned over to a village community group Canolfan Y Fron and it will open in May 2018 as a community centre, with a shop, cafe, community rooms and an 18-bed tourism accommodation unit. http://www.dailypost.co.uk/news/north-wales-news/ysgol-bronyfoel-fron-gwynedd-flats--12274729

Llyn Nantlle Uchaf (Upper Nantlle Lake) is a lake in the Nantlle Valley, Gwynedd, Wales. The lake forms the foreground in Richard Wilson's painting "Snowdon from Llyn Nantlle".Llyn Nantlle Isaf (Lower Nantlle Lake) no longer exists as it was drained to protect the slate works.

Cilgwyn quarry is a slate quarry located on the north edge of the Nantlle Vale, in North Wales. It is one of the earliest slate quarries in Great Britain, being worked as early as the 12th century. King Edward I of England was reputed to have stayed in a house roofed by Cilgwyn slates, during the Welsh wars of independence. It is one of the major slate quarries in the Nantlle Valley area.

Bryngwyn railway station is a former station which was the terminus for passengers on the Bryngwyn Branch of the North Wales Narrow Gauge Railways, and later the Welsh Highland Railway. Beyond the station, an incline climbed the slope of Moel Tryfan to serve a series of slate quarries. Those connected by tramways to the incline head included the Alexandra quarry, Moel Tryfan quarry, Fron quarry, Braich quarry and Cilgwyn quarry.

Moel Tryfan (429 m / 1407 ft) is a small mountain near the villages of Rhosgadfan, Y Fron and Betws Garmon, in northern Gwynedd. The higher and more famous peak of Tryfan above Dyffryn Ogwen has also sometimes been referred to as "Moel Tryfan" in the past. Moel Tryfan could be regarded as the westerly outlier of the larger Mynydd Mawr. The southern and eastern flanks of the mountain were heavily quarried in the past, particularly at Moel Tryfran Quarry and Cilgwyn quarry.

Carmel is a small village near Y Fron in Gwynedd, north-west Wales. The village is built up mainly of Victorian homes, with a more modern area. The village contains a number of chapels, which are gradually closing down and some being converted into homes. The Victorian village school and post office have also been closed. The last of the village's shops closed in 2014 (Siop Doris). There are a number of other businesses including a driving school, coal merchant and a garage. Nearby villages are Penygroes and Groeslon. Notable residents have included Dafydd Glyn Jones, Sir Thomas Parry (1904-1985), Principal of University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, from 1958 to 1969 and the artist Ifor Pritchard.

Alexandra quarry was a slate quarry in North Wales, on the slopes of Moel Tryfan in north Gwynedd. It was part of one of the major slate quarrying regions of Wales, centred on the Nantlle Valley during the 19th and 20th centuries. Output increased when a connection to the North Wales Narrow Gauge Railways branch to Bryngwyn was created. It closed in the late 1930s, but was subsequently amalgamated with the Moel Tryfan quarry, and production continued until the 1960s.

Tal-y-sarn (Welsh pronunciation) is a village in the slate quarrying Nantlle Valley in Gwynedd, Wales, next to Penygroes. It is part of the community of Llanllyfni and includes some of Llandwrog. The ward had a population of 1,930 at the 2011 census, the built-up area having a population of 1,086.The Welsh language poet Robert Williams Parry was born in 37, Station Road, Tal-y-sarn, where a plaque designed by R. L. Gapper commemorates the connection. Other persons connected with the village were Annant, quarryman, preacher and bard, Gwilym R. Jones, bard and journalist, Idwal Jones author of the Welsh-language radio series SOS, Galw Gari Tryfan and Dame Elan Closs Stephens DBE (born 1948) a Welsh educator and Wales' representative on the BBC Board. The 19th century methodist preacher John Jones, Tal-y-sarn, is also connected with the village, not by birth but because he settled here, becoming a shopkeeper and quarry owner as a sideline to his main vocation.The song "Ciosg Talysarn" by the Welsh folk singer Dafydd Iwan was written after two secret agents were found bugging a public telephone in Tal-y-sarn in 1982.Tal-y-sarn is covered by a Neighbourhood Policing Team based in the nearby village of Pen-y-groes.

Rhosgadfan is a Welsh village in the county of Gwynedd, formerly in the historic county of Caernarfonshire, and in the community of Llanwnda. It is notable as the birthplace of Kate Roberts, one of the greatest Welsh-language writers of the 20th century; her childhood home is now a museum (see below).

Nantlle was a railway station located in Talysarn, a neighbouring village to Nantlle, in Gwynedd, Wales. From 1828 the narrow gauge, horse-drawn Nantlle Railway ran from wharves at Caernarfon through Penygroes and through the site of the future Nantlle station to slate quarries around the village of Nantlle. In the 1860s the Carnarvonshire Railway built a new standard gauge line southwards from Caernarfon to Afon Wen, replacing the Nantlle Railway's tracks as far south as Penygroes. The Nantlle quarries and railway were very much still in business, so they continued to send their products to Caernarfon by transhipping them onto the new railway at Tyddyn Bengam a short distance north of Penygroes. This arrangement continued until 1872 when the LNWR repeated the earlier process and built a standard gauge branch partly on the Nantlle Railway trackbed from Penygroes to Talysarn, where it built a wholly new passenger station which it called Nantlle, though in reality the branch only reached half way to the village of Nantlle. This station included a locomotive servicing area at its eastern end.From then onwards products were transshipped from the quarry wagons onto standard gauge wagons in the goods yard at "Nantlle" station. The narrow gauge wagons were manoeuvred by horse and by hand, a way of working which, remarkably, survived until 1963. Passenger traffic along the branch, which was less than a mile and a half long, was not heavy. The station closed to normal passenger traffic in 1932, though excursion traffic (mostly outbound from Nantlle) continued until 1939. The station closed completely in 1963. The station building was still standing in 2012, though most other infrastructure had long been built over.