AN YSGOL Y Moelwyn pupil is one of the stars of Blaenau Ffestiniog’s latest attraction.

A new deep mine tour in Llechwedd Slate Caverns, featuring enhanced reality technology, explosive special effects and “compelling” storytelling, helps convey reality of life underground for Victorian mine workers.

Traditional storytelling is a key feature of the tour: Llechwedd’s expert local guides, many of whom have multi-generational family links to the slate industry and incredible family stories of their own, will accompany visitors on the hour-long tour.

Gwion Williams, a Year 7 pupil, plays the role of a 12-year-old miner who works in the mine with his uncle and cousin.

“I didn’t know much about the history and slate industry before, but I know a lot more now,” Gwion told the Cambrian News.

“It was really impressive, I’d never been in Llechwedd before, but it was fascinating.

“The company was looking for someone local to voice my character and I was chosen out of the five best – I can’t imagine not going to school and having to work in the mines for 12 hours a day in the dark, it would be horrible.”

The new tour begins with a ride underground on the steepest cable railway in Britain. As visitors make their journey 500 feet down into the belly of the mountain the clock will turn back 160 years.

Thanks to clever light projections, enhanced reality technology and 3D animations, visitors will ‘meet’ the mine’s owner and founder, John Whitehead Greaves, as well as some of the men and boys who spent up to 12 hours a day, six days a week, working underground in semi-darkness.

See the full story in this week’s Meirionnydd edition of the Cambrian News