8 outta 10 ain't bad

I was going to title this blog, “Move along, nothing to see here!” but as will become apparent later that wouldn’t have been quite true. So I plagiarised a Meatloaf song instead – for those of a certain age, and mindset, you will appreciate that I did rather better than Meatloaf did!!!!

The aim of this training session was to REALLY test myself over a prolonged period, so Guy and I returned to the Mamores with a different strategy to last time. My aim was to tackle the whole ridge travelling light, whereas Guy was going to tackle a shorter section having recently completed the hundred miles of The South Downs Way recently.

Flying out of Luton to Glasgow on the Friday night to pick up a car and drive through to Fort William seems like a good plan, until there are delays. I won’t bore you with the detail, but arriving around half past midnight when you aim to be on the mountain by 6:00 is not ideal. A very truncated sleep followed; including a suggestion by a wide awake me to get going at 4:30, rejected by a tired Guy.

On the hill at 6:15 wasn’t a bad effort but thick cloud on the summits had been forecast and so it proved. It took a little over 2 hours to make the first summit, a route I remembered well from last year’s expedition and the broken stake where Jim tried to climb the fence remained. I have to be truthful and say if I don’t see that ascent again I wouldn’t be too disappointed.  With nothing to see I cracked on through the cloud, grateful for the assistance of my GPS app.

To be honest ticking off the first summits, having been there before in better conditions, was at best perfunctory. The aim was to spend at least 12 hours on my feet, so I took a decision to miss out Sgurr a'Mhaim because I had done it before in our last attempt and it was out and retrace steps and would gain me nothing. And so onwards to Am Bodach, as far as we got last time around.  As I approached the summit there was the vaguest essence of watery sunshine trying to peak through the gloom. On the summit I could see the vague outlines of the summits I had just done, but not much more. Suddenly I turned to leave and was greeted by this:

Arguably one of the most amazing sights I have ever seen. Crystal clear peaking above the clouds Bidean nam Bian, what a sight, the snow patches on the summit making it look like a killer whale surfacing in the ocean.

Sadly there was no time to be lost, so back into the cloud I went bagging summit after summit until An Garbhanach, where I saw the first people of the day, two fell runners, sadly for me I couldn’t locate the route to An Gearanch, despite map and GPS, so rather than dally (it was another out and back on the ridge) I took the decision to return another day.

Shortly after this whom should I meet but Guy on his way down from what he thought was the summit of Na Gruagaichean. The reason for his error was easy to see when I arrived at what he thought was the summit and was confronted by this:

Quite surreal, however, the real summit was a few hundred metres higher up. Guy could probably feel his ears burn as I cursed having to haul myself through a horrid boulder field.

As I mentioned, in the cloud I was having to rely very heavily on my map and GPS and the route I was following is one which isn’t so widely used and thus often there were no paths. Leaving the summit I have to say that for a good half hour to an hour, I was worried that I was way off-piste, considering a call so that someone could check my location using my phone. Thankfully I had no signal so was forced to trust my instincts and as if by magic I was back on a path – phew! There I met 4 lads from Notts who were keen to get back for the football – no idea why?!?!?

As I left the summit I met the last people I would all day in circumstances which showed how poor visibility was. They were less than 10 metres away, but clearly hadn’t seen me and I heard them more than saw them as they discussed where the path I was on ought to be. To their surprise a voice from the gloom pointing them in the right direction must have been quite un-nerving!

At 18:30 I made the final summit, 12 hours and 15 minutes after starting, now all that remained was the long slog back to where Guy would either be waiting or else where I would text as soon as I got a signal. By this time I was pretty tired and the descent involved a lot of slips and slides which I could have done without and then having to take socks and shoes off to wade across a river. It was a boggy trudge back I can tell you. Then when I got to the car park unsurprisingly Guy wasn’t there, watching the football I was sure, but no phone signal so I had some walking on tarmac to do until I picked up a signal. Whilst it was still light I didn’t expect anyone to be around at 21:00 so when a minibus approached I hoped for a lift and was terribly disappointed when I was passed without acknowledgement on the tiny single track road – clearly not a native or REAL outdoor enthusiast!

After a mile or so my phone exploded with incoming messages and texts and after much fumbling managed to get a pleading text out to Guy, who came and collected me at 21:45 (perhaps it was serendipitous that Russia should equalise then!!!!)

As a graphic illustration of how out of sorts I was, I couldn’t even eat half of my haggis and chips and I only had two pints whilst watching the highlights in our room – an epic day, proving that I am certainly fit enough to do The Matterhorn. Now the only things that will stop me are the weather and how I react to altitude, none of which I can control. Someone more erudite said, “all you can do is control the controllables”, so now after a few days off it will be back to the usual training regime with just over two months until departure.

Thanks for reading

Support from the stars

Well it's a little more than a month since my last update, but that doesn't mean nothing has been happening.

Firstly in order to raise the profile of the causes I am supporting I had some t-shirts made which point people towards the summary website www.mainsersmatterhorn.com which is a simple way to see how to sponsor me.

First up to model them was my eldest daughter Lily who proudly wore it for her senior team debut for our squash club, Luton and Dunstable.

However, I think she would concede that she was trumped with the awesome support of my favourite Australian squash player Cameron Pilley who wore it during his warm up in the semi-final of the Canary Wharf Classic, broadcast live on TV

I was in the audience cheering him on, but my wife Debbie managed to catch this screenshot, I cannot thank him enough for his support and kind words.

As for my preparations I am continuing to work with Gary Nisbet My current weekly routine is as follows:

Warm-up - Round the clock lunges one without weight, other with 20Kg, 2 sets

Squats 6 Reps at 70Kg 3 sets

Single Leg Deadlift 6 Reps each leg at 40Kg 3 sets

Turkish get up 6 each arm 9Kg

Bench Press 8 x 18Kg, followed by low row pulley 8 x 30Kg 4 sets

Then alternate to the following 48 hours later

Same warm up

Squat press 6 reps at 40Kg 3 sets

Deadlift 6 reps at 80kg 3 sets

Glute ham raises 6 reps 3 sets

and finish with an attempt to do 8 pull-ups followed immediately by 20 press ups, 4 sets (I haven't managed a complete set of pull ups yet in all honesty.

Then back to the original. 

This weekend sees my final progression with Gary so I await with slight nervousness for what's in store.

For a long time I was quite dispirited by my lack of ability at pull-ups, however, recently I saw a well sculpted man in the gym doing narrow pull-ups with a weight between his ankles and felt suitably inadequate until I asked if he could do wide ones with no weight as I do, I cannot begin to explain the feeling tantamount to adulation I felt when he barely managed 4, certainly gave me a boost to keep pushing.

In addition to the S&C work I have been doing some extra CV work in addition to my squash, principally bike intervals kindly supplied by Nick Matthew - they certainly work up a sweat.

I will finish for now on a blog piece written on the BBC which highlights graphically why defibrillators are so important and why I want to raise enough funds to buy one for the club

http://www.bbc.co.uk/guides/zc2fg82

Thanks for reading.

A word from Guy

I asked Guy to give me a few thoughts on the expedition for the blog:

About fifteen years ago, Paul invited me to join a party attempting a few of the gentler Munros. For a man whose experiences of Scotland were the familiar urban tourist traps of Glasgow and Edinburgh, I anticipated something akin to the Lake District or the Yorkshire Moors.  Standing atop my first Munro, with the beginner’s luck of a rare cloudless day,  I marvelled at the seemingly endless wilderness and wondered whether, halfway up the ridge, I had climbed through the back of some Highland wardrobe and into another country. England had nothing on this. No distant rumble of the M6, no gift shops selling pointless knick-knacks,  no queues, no people, no nothing. I was hooked.

Fast forward ten years: Paul and I had kept our annual date with the Highlands with a dwindling and changing bunch of companions. I’d trudged, slithered, scrambled and sweated my way up and down thirty or so Munros with midge bites and blisters to prove it. Whilst not exactly smug, I was pretty pleased with myself. I was no Kenton Cool but had at least ascended to some comfortable mental base camp. Then Paul, whose concept of a challenge extends beyond a fun run or a dry January, upped the ante.

‘I’m 50 in 2016. I want to climb the Matterhorn and I want you to come with me.’ Before I could think of the hundred sensible reasons to say no, I said yes.

And so began the process of courses at climbing walls, the purchasing of ropes, helmets and ice axes, winter training, lessons in navigation and more ambitious forays into Skye, Ben Nevis and Glen Coe. Paul took to it all like a duck to water, increasing his fitness, changing his body shape dramatically and working through technical challenges with an Aberdonian determination befitting a man from the Granite City. 

Like Ringo or Jamie Murray, I play my part. For a man with arthritic knees, knot dyslexia and a thigh circumference about fifty per cent that of Paul, the sight of him receding into the distance as we tackle a steep incline or bone-jarring descent has become a familiar one.  I have experienced anxiety, fear, pain and fatigue in varying degrees and sometimes simultaneously.

So why do I do it? Because, when suspended on the TD Gap on Skye or tracing my boot along the Inaccessible Pinnacle in search of a foothold, there is nothing in life that matters more.  My inbox, an impending meeting,  the irritation of an unexpected bill.  It’s the only time that none of these distractions is in my head.  The most extreme moments are the ones of greatest clarity.

One day I won’t be able to any of this. Ten years? I’ll be 62. Who knows when the niggles, aches and pains become something more debilitating and where the descent from life’s physical pinnacle reaches the lowlands of old age.  What I do know is that, whenever it happens, no achievements currently surpass traversing the Black Cuillin ridge or climbing Twisting Gully in winter.  A successful attempt on the Matterhorn would form the front cover of my personal scrapbook.

Being in such wilderness can often be a time of introspection, soul-searching and personal challenges.  All of this ignores the single, most important reason why I do it – the companionship. Last August,  I joined Paul on his family holiday in Assynt. One evening, Paul, his daughter Lily and I tramped to a bothy within sight of Suilven, a ridge beautiful even in the context of its stunning surroundings.   Paul had surpassed his high standard of preparation by carrying firewood in his rucksack, so we could light a fire in the small grate. With Lily snug in her sleeping bag, Paul and I poured a generous dram into plastic cups and sat back. For a wordless hour, we watched the sun cast its last shadows over the mountain, as the sky changed from mid to deep, star-pricked blue. The only sound was the occasional spit from an ember.  Conversation, or anything else, was unnecessary. This was life as it should be lived. 

Dodgy weather and dodgy knees

As my national bard said more eloquently than I, "The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men
Gang aft agley"!

So it was for my Scottish winter mountain training expedition on the weekend of 5th Feb.

First of all the sleeper was late into Glasgow, the weather forecast had been grim all week in the run up so maximising time on the hill in reasonable weather was a priority. So after throwing down some breakfast we went to collect the hire car only to find it wasn't going to be available for another hour. So what should have been an 8am departure from Glasgow turned into a 10am one. That will be the last time I use Sixt I have to say.

As we drove north it became clear that our initial plan of climbing Beinn Narnain and Beinn Ime was simply not possible, especially in the dire weather. So after a reassessment we decided to head straight for Glencoe and do a reconnaissance on our ultimate target of Stob Coire nan Lochan. The idea was to walk up into the corrie bowl and have a look at conditions ahead of Saturday's assault.

The snow level was a lot higher than last year and it was clear that conditions in the crags higher up were, as one climber we met put it, "thin".

However, the forecast for Saturday was for colder weather and further snowfall so all was not lost yet, so we returned to the car grateful at least to have got out albeit we were pretty soggy and windswept by the time we checked in at The Clachaig.

There followed a very pleasant evening spent with a Paris based couple who were touring the area, one originally from the Black Isle and the other an American where we enjoyed a few of the numerous beers on offer.

So off we set on Saturday in reasonable weather with it forecast to deteriorate. The first thing that struck me arriving at the car park was how busy it was - we got the last space and it wasn't even 9am! All tooled up, with ropes and other gear we set off passing a few people on the way and seeing climbers well into the distance. After an hour or so it was clear to me that Guy was struggling, despite making better time than the day before. As I caught up with a group who were putting on their crampons and harnesses I took the opportunity of the last bit of shelter from the biting wind to wait for Guy. When he arrived my suspicions were well founded and we agreed to tackle the final slope before the corrie bowl to assess what we might do. On arrival it was the mountain equivalent of Piccadilly Circus!

Guy declared that he couldn't do any climbing at that point, a mixture of pain and loss of confidence faced with the crags and the clear deterioration in the weather conditions, and said he would make his way down on his own. I couldn't let him do that after what happened to Jim last summer so the decision was taken to abort for the day.

The forecast for Sunday was atrocious with gusts of wind at the summit in excess of 80mph and heavy snow. When we awoke the wind was definitely stronger, and sure enough snow was coming down in the Glen. We agreed to head south and revisit our Friday objectives. As we headed across Rannoch Moor the snow started getting very heavy and several times I nearly lost the car despite doing very modest speeds. (grainy pic taken by passenger Guy!)

In all honesty I was grateful to get to Bridge of Orchy without leaving the road. By then the snow had turned to rain but it was hosing down, so we stopped at a nice cafe in Inveruglas and assess the situation. The wind was getting stronger and the Met Office hourly forecast indicated no improvement until 4pm, so we abandoned all thoughts of mountain activity and instead spent the afternoon "date-style" at the Glasgow Modern Art Museum, followed by the rather brilliant, if harrowing Spotlight followed by a curry in the rather marvellous Koh-I-Noor restaurant, before heading back to catch the sleeper back south.

My abiding principle in all my expeditions is that a key element of success is getting home safely and it hit us profoundly as we discovered in the dining car, enjoying a Laphroig, that there had been an avalanche that day, but thankfully no one was seriously hurt!

All in all somewhat disappointing as far as training and practice goes, however, I still feel confident that I am on schedule to reach the summit of The Matterhorn in August.

Fundraising has now started in earnest and details of how to sponsor me can be found on www.MainsersMatterhorn.com

Thanks for your support

Paul

No going back now

Well here it is 2016 and the year I tackle the might of The Matterhorn.

Form here on in I will be posting at least monthly to update progress and bore you all into submission.

During the October half term last year I went with the family to Skye for a week which was fabulous and whilst I didn't do any serious climbing it was good to get out into the hills and enjoy some great weather, including getting sunburned! (Yes you did read that right)

Anyway the festive period is well and truly over and preparations are beginning in earnest. Key dates this year are 1st of Feb (Happy Birthday to me!) when the fundraising launch happens at Lewsey Sports Park to coincide with the 1sts v 2nds of Luton and Dunstable Squash Club. The captains have indulged me with a rather fabulous gift by allowing Lily and Natalie to play in either side at 5th string.

5th Feb 3 days in Glencoe hopefully getting some winter climbing in. Potentially Guy and my first foray into doing it for ourselves so to speak!

Then it's into 10th June where I am going to do the whole Mamore traverse in one hit travelling light.

Finally departure date for Geneva is 17th August and flights are booked and second and penultimate installment has been paid to James our guide, with summit attempts scheduled for either 23rd or 24th!

It's suddenly all very real.

As mentioned elsewhere the whole purpose of this effort is to raise funds for a defibrillator in our club at Lewsey and any surplus going to C-R-Y in memory of Harry Faulkner.

Donations to the former can be made via here when the target of £2,000 is reached then please go here

I would also like to take the opportunity to thank two people who have contributed hugely in kind to the cause with their support. Gary Nisbet of Unique Fitness Solutions for transforming me from a weakling into being complimented as being "strong" by a young woman at the gym which caused me to blush like a teenage virgin. Mohammed Azam who has designed and created this rather fabulous website which has a considerably sexier name than this blog and has facilitated me being able to design a suitable t-shirt

The Glories of Assynt

Just before we departed for our holiday I read this about our destination. It’s considerably more erudite than I could ever be. I am not sure people realise quite how far away Assynt is, but it’s a good 13 hour drive if done continuously from my home and it definitely has an “other worldly” feel to it. We chose to break ours up with an overnight in Glasgow. It was still a relief to arrive at the cottage late on the Saturday afternoon and see my brother and his family who were across from Aberdeen for a few days camping.

I have to be honest and say that the two weeks in splendid isolation was exactly what I needed to recharge the batteries. As if to underline how isolated the area is when we attended Mass, celebrated by the irrepressible octogenarian Monsignor Basil, we doubled the congregation and halved the average age!

Lily and I attempted to go wild camping on Ben More Assynt, but were thwarted as Lily ran out of steam just before the bealach. It speaks volumes of her fatigue that I pitched the tent mid-afternoon and she crawled in, ate her lunch and promptly fell very soundly asleep. Over an hour later she awoke and it was clear that the best option was to head back down, despite her protestations that we could finish the job the next day. It would have been easy to figuratively crack the whip and get us up to the summit, but I wanted Lily to enjoy the experience and want to grow to love the outdoors – we will have many other opportunities to wild camp. Thankfully she appeared to survive the experience with no loss of enthusiasm for future adventure.

I managed to do a bit of climbing on the sea rocks, of which there are many, however, not as much as I had hoped. Guy also visited us and it was during this time we decided to experience a bothy for the first time. Lily was desperate to join us and to be honest I was a bit nervous of taking her given the Spartan nature of their reputation has, so when the opportunity to do a reconnaissance mission presented itself I took it. What a superb place it was, it even had a dart board! 

The walk into the bothy at the base of Suilven was without incident albeit it was very, very windy. We had even managed to pick up a set of darts from one of these wee shops you find in villages that seem to have all sorts of games in them – I could tell they had been in stock for a while with the pictures of Jocky Wilson and John Lowe adorning them! To say Lily was thrilled with the place would be an understatement. I was able to carry in some logs so once it got a bit chilly we got a fire going and after a few rounds of darts (which I won remarkably!) we ate our simple, but delicious pasta dinner. Initially Lily wanted to have one of the rooms on her own, but the solitude and wind led to her bravado deserting her and she asked if I could share her room (sweet!) Guy and I shared a dram of Laphroig watching a beautiful moon pass over Suilven and realising that exactly a year from that point we ought to be summiting The Matterhorn. As Guy pointed out we would be reflecting the night in the bothy when we did that.

I got little sleep as the wind howled but it was a great experience for us all, even to the extent that Lily thought it was the highlight of the holiday and was so effusive that her younger sister wants to go next time as does, even more remarkably, Debbie too!!!! Lily decided not to tackle Suilven the next day as the winds continued to be very strong, so again my ambition for getting height was thwarted, but I couldn’t blame her. Guy gave it ago but had to turn back before the summit and the cloud had dropped so we missed nothing.

Next day was Stac Pollaidh and it’s fair to say I have never experienced so many midges in my life, they were awful. They were so bad that in swallowing some Debs had cause to vomit. Once in the breeze and out of the trees it was much more pleasant and we enjoyed a pleasant stroll around the base, whilst Guy summited the Eastern Buttress before scrambling across the traverse to the higher Western Buttress. In his words, “I could have played up there all day the scrambling was so good!”, no wonder it’s often referred to as Scotland’s best small mountain.

As Guy departed the end of a fabulous break loomed, but not before I visited surely the smallest castle in the world, made of concrete and fits one at a squeeze on the nearby Achmelvich Beach.

Apparently it was built by an eccentric who stayed there one night before abandoning it - all very bizarre.

On the final day I got up Quinag, what a great wee mountain that is too. It proved to me beyond doubt that height isn’t everything. All in all it was a great way to bring the holiday to a close.

Now back in the metropolis that is the South East it’s less than a year until The Matterhorn. Guy and I have a winter expedition planned for February, a summer jaunt (to get out of here when the Queen’s Birthday celebrations are on) next June and a family trip to Skye later this month all part of the training towards the ultimate goal.

As a bit of a footnote, I really wanted to see the recently released Everest in the cinema. Unsurprisingly Lily wanted to go with me, but I was concerned when Natalie also expressed a desire to go. Thankfully that prompted Debs to join us as Nat lasted barely 10 minutes before her upset led first to tears then the exit with her mum and Lily took the opportunity to join her. They grabbed some dinner and Natalie in particular had to be convinced by Wikipedia and other such resources that Everest was considerably bigger than The Matterhorn! Most expensive film I have ever watched, but thoroughly enjoyable as a climber.

Finally, it shouldn’t be too long before the opportunity to sponsor me becomes available, watch this space!

A stark learning experience

As an enthusiastic squash coach I try and encourage any players to learn from the losses. You learn more from a defeat than you do from a victory and this weekend in the Mamores was a classic example.

I have already stated the aim in an earlier blog post, a traverse of The Mamore ridge which takes in 10 Munros. At very late notice Guy and I had a passenger in the shape of an old rugby friend of mine Jim. From the off he had no expectations of being able to tackle the ridge, and was acutely aware that we couldn’t hang around waiting for him once we got going.

The journey through to Fort William went pretty much to plan, however, my first inkling that things may not quite go as planned happened as early as the shopping trip in Morrisions for getting provisions on the hill including our night out. I had to make a longer than expected pit stop and when I returned found that as I queued to pay for mine, the others had already finished and I raised an eyebrow that Guy had not bought anything that needed the stove (I had gone for pasta and a sauce we could have shared – high carb). Being an adult that was his decision but I knew I would want a hot meal when it was late at night and the forecast wind and rain arrived.

So on down into Glen Nevis and conditions were excellent, setting off at 11:20 on schedule and we picked up the initial path very easily until we joined the forestry track, where everything disappeared under an explosion of bark and general forestry waste. We ploughed on slowly until we spotted a style at the other side of the burn, however, that could only be accessed by climbing a fence.  I went first, then Guy, when the post gave way and snapped, challenging Jim to get over. Once over I spotted someone on the ridge and we realised we would have to take on a very steep ascent to get there albeit on decent enough ground. Jim took the sensible decision to part the ways.

Guy and I plodded to the ridge where we met a fellow walker who felt the path up which we had been given was fictitious!!!! So on we went to the first summit, Mullach nan Coirean, passing some snow on the way.

 Back on the gps line I was beginning to feel a bit more confident we could at least knock a hole in the route that evening, albeit I was already very pessimistic that we could make the bealach after Binnein Mor where we had planned to camp.

The way to Stob Ban was uneventful and my theory shared with Jim that he could have made that in leisurely time and then escaped onto the West Highland Way into Kinlochleven was vindicated. It was then that Jim called from A&E telling us that he had slipped and broken his ankle in 3 places!!!!

Next on the list was Sgurr an lubhair, which is described as an ex-Munro having been relegated from that elite status. Here there was a fabulous lochan which allowed us to top up our water supplies. At this point it was clear Guy was struggling and as Sgurr a’Mhaim was a peak captured and then returned by the same route I suggested that I walk for about an hour and a half, bagging Am Bodach and pitching the tent on the other side and getting the pan on so that tea would be ready when he arrived, if not hot food!

The view from the summit of Sgurr a’Mhaim was the highlight of the day. For virtually the whole day Ben Nevis was shrouded in cloud, however, by 8pm it showed its grandeur – absolutely stunning. 

The ridge along to Sgurr a’Mhairm is airy in places and a few years ago I would have been tiptoeing across full of fear, but thanks to NLP that has long ceased to be an issue.

So on to Am Bodach and the prospect of dinner. For the third time that day I met a team doing a Ramsay Round – now that’s a serious challenge. By now the forecast cloud was beginning to come in and the rain started. The route down into the bealach where I spotted a suitable spot to camp for the evening was a bit steep and a bit unstable underfoot and I was glad to reach the bottom. It was the last time I would be pleased for some time.

I went to my rucksack to pull out the tent and I wouldn’t be surprised if some readers heard my profane and industrial language from there. It was not the tent that Guy and I had invested in for just such trips. It later transpired that Guy had chosen it because it was lighter…..I had no idea how to put the thing together (I am crap at that kind of thing at the best of times and had practised with the other tent several times to perfect an expedient pitch) so I had to wait for Guy. The sweat had taken its toll on my new t-shirt so I quickly changed and got the stove going and enjoyed my pasta with relish, all the while keeping an eye out for Guy. An hour later and I was starting to get seriously worried as the clag closed in. (I found out later that Guy couldn’t find the way off the summit so sat things out for 20 minutes whilst he waited for a break in the cloud) Eventually he heard my calls and joined me and after a fashion got the tent up.

Normally that would be a cause for celebration; however, this tent would barely have fitted two pygmies far less two adult men with rucksacks. In conditions where we could barely move sleep was a foreign entity. Around 2.30 am Guy stated, “We’ll laugh about this one day…just not now” as the wind and rain howled and managed to penetrate the tent. He is of course correct, but we could have died from exposure up there as there was no way we could get down in the dark in the circumstances.

Guy was “done”, and I couldn’t leave him to make his own way down so the decision was taken at 5.30 to break camp and follow what looked to be a reasonable escape route to get us back to the car and abandon the expedition.

I would love to say the escape was uneventful, but it wasn’t as we slid down shiny slippery rocks braking to ensure we didn’t fall into the gorge below, then having to pick a route down a precipitous face using trees to arrest us as we went, then having to ford a river before completing the job by crossing the Steal Bridge.

We managed to get hold of Jim and he met us in the car park with the help of a taxi driver and agreed lunch at The Clachaig Inn was in order. A rather fantastic curry was had in Glasgow that evening as we bumped into lots of AC/DC fans on their way to their gig at Hampden before dumping the hire car and binning the wholly inadequate tent.

Lessons learned

Make sure you take the right equipment – double check it if you are relying on someone else taking it.

Make sure navigation skills are up to being able to cope with zero visibility.

I am already well down the road of planning another go at tackling the full Mamore ridge, but I doubt Guy will.

Next up is a couple of weeks in Assynt at the lovely Clachtoll Beach where I aim to get some climbing as well as hiking done - just hoping for better weather than last years family holiday in that neck of the woods!

Finally, I post this on the 150th anniversary of the first successful ascent of The Matterhorn and leave with this rather lovely picture of the route up.