Four friends, all 19, climbed Mount Snowdon to raise money for Marie Curie

Four friends trekked up Wales’s highest mountain in the dead of night to raise money for charity.

Joe Jeffrey, Charlie Severn, Sam Newton and Craig Crawford, all 19, climbed Mount Snowdon on Saturday night to raise money for Marie Curie in memory of Craig’s father, Andrew Crawford, who died from cancer.

The four friends decided to climb Snowdon during the night, not only to do a slightly different challenge, but also because it would be quieter with less climbers jostling to get up the mountain, and they thought watching the sunrise at the top of the mountain would be spectacular.

They drove to Wales in the evening and were given the set-off time of 11.48pm. They took just under four hours to reach the top.

Joe said: “It was strange climbing up in the dark. You couldn’t really see apart from whatever our head torches showed us a few feet ahead. It was a bit slippery but we didn’t have any injuries.”

The friends made it up to the top unscathed, and watched the sunrise over Wales, from 1,085 metres up.

Climbing back down was somewhat easier, and they made it back down in around two hours.

It wasn’t until they got back in their car and started to drive back home that the exhaustion of climbing through the night hit them.

Joe said: “We all got in the car and it just hit us that we had climbed all the way up and come back down on no sleep, when we all got home we all just slept all day.

“We did enjoy it enough to do it again.”

So far the team have raised more than £1,700 for Marie Curie, and Asda ­— where Joe works­— has agreed to donate £200 to top up the total to nearly £2,000.

To make a donation, log on to Joe's JustGiving page here.