Llyn Padarn
Photo via Wikimedia Commons — licence & author.
The classic Snowdonia SUP
This is a quick reference, not a full walked guide. The facts below — location, parking, grid reference and access — are maintained from our dataset, but we haven't published our own first-hand write-up of Llyn Padarn yet. Know it well? Help us get it right.
Two miles of clean glacial water beneath Dolbadarn Castle and the mouth of the Llanberis Pass — the most popular, and arguably the most scenic-per-stroke, paddleboarding lake in North Wales. Launch from Y Glyn (the 'lagoons') and go early, when the water is glassiest and the mountains double in the reflection. It's free to paddle, but the water stays cold all year, so treat cold-water safety seriously. Parking is paid.
Getting there
Llyn Padarn is in Llanberis, Eryri (Snowdonia). It's roughly 6 min (0.9 miles) from Llanberis , and within reach of Bethesda (17 min) and Caernarfon (20 min).
The nearest parking: Y Glyn / lagoons car park or Padarn Country Park. Grid reference SH 566 606 — works on any OS map and doesn't need a phone signal.
Good to know
Launch from Y Glyn (the 'lagoons'); mornings are glassiest. Free to paddle; watch for cold water year-round.
On the map
View Llyn Padarn on OpenStreetMap ↗, or open it in the Explore Wales trip planner to add it to a day out with drive times and offline maps.
Staying over?
Llanberis makes a relaxed base for exploring the area — worth staying over to catch an early start or a golden-hour finish.
Browse places to stay near Llanberis ↗ opens Booking.com — needs signalNearby places
Make Llyn Padarn part of a day out
Add it to a trip in the free Explore Wales planner — chained drive times, weather, campsite suggestions, and offline maps for when the signal drops.