Scafell scree fails to slow

Three Peaks Challenge Solo

What a special moment on the 30^th day of the month at precisely 3:30:30, I left the car and attempted to complete the three peaks challenge – climbing the three highest mountains in Scotland, England and Wales in under 24 hours.  To make it harder, I was doing this challenge solo, with only the aid of driver Andy.

Ben Nevis (Scotland):

I was really looking forward to climbing Ben Nevis and becoming one of only a few people to have done this as a solo climber, so off I went earlier than was originally planned due to the adverse weather expected later in the evening.  The weather started off reasonably well and I made good progress, but about 2 hours into the climb, the weather started getting worse, with visibility dropping and stronger wind and rain.  I was feeling extremely confident about reaching the top and it wasn’t long before I could see various point markers showing the way to the summit and finally there is was after around 2 hours 30 minutes.  I joined a few other people for some photographs and then I needed to get back down – well the scenes weren’t worth hanging around for anyway because of all the cloud!

I pretty much ran down the mountain, and it only took just over an hour and 40 to get down, so I completed the entire climb and descent in 4 hours 12 minutes.  A quick change and it was off to Scafell Pike, one of the most complicated climbs for navigating in the dark, and so it proved to be….

Scafell Pike (England)

We arrived at around 1.15am, after getting about an hour’s sleep en route, with the weather  getting far worse as we approached the start.

I set off around 1.40am in pitch dark, walking alongside a raging river, although dark the head torch was working – always a bonus!

The route was pretty good, and then it seemed to disappear, looking at the map, I knew I had to cross the river at somepoint, however the path seemed to carry on to the left of the raging waters – so I followed it, then things seemed to get a bit more difficult and I found myself heading up a slope which just got steeper and steeper.

I was soon on my hands and knees heading up scree (loose stones) and long wet grass and rocks, I sat, and looked up at what seemed like the top of a ridge, so I carried on. I then sat down and looked at the map again and I said to myself oh bother! (think it was a little ruder than that).

I decided that I needed to retrace my steps – or more to the point slide down the side of the mountain on my backside. I felt that it was safer to slide down the grass, as opposed to the scree, in order not to relase any rocks from above.

(picture shows where I ended up getting lost – 350metres up)

I finally made it back to the crossing point after following the river back and bumped into a family that was dong the three peaks who I met on Ben Nevis. They had already done Scafell before and knew the crossing point, so I joined them for a little while.

 I started to make better progress again, until the path kept disappearing and reappearing, and then the family and I realised we were slightly lost again and had to do some serious navigation yet again.  We managed to finally find a track after veering off to the left, and met someone coming back down as they had given up due to the fact that visibility was down to about 10 metres.  They joined us and we successfully found the markers and made it to the peak – again the views were terrible, but at least it was now daylight!

I then left and headed back down as the sun started to come up, although couldn’t actually see the sun but at least I could see the track.  I came to the crossing at the river again, and it seemed to have got worse and ended up stepping about a foot into the water so the next 30minutes or so my feet were soaked.

I made it back down to the car, after exactly 5 hours, probably losing about an hour in getting lost, which meant there was a little worry about making the three peaks in under 24hours.

Snowdon (Wales)

We arrived at the base of Snowdon around 11am, so luckily time was still on my side. After reaching the Miners trail, the weather was so much better, in fact the sun came out for 10 minutes, however along the route I spoke to a number of people they said that the weather was quite bad on the tops.

The route was so much easier than the first two climbs, and more scenic as I could actually see! After an hour the route then got steeper, and the temperature dropped.  The route was a little slower towards the summit, due to the amount of people on the mountain, however, I still made pretty good progress and got to the summit after 2 hours 8 minutes.

I started to head back down, my quads (thighs) were really starting to hurt now but I knew I needed to get back and complete the hardest of all my challenges so far.  After 3 hours and 47 minutes I reached the car and was over the moon that I had completed the three peaks in 23 hours and 23 minutes.

I felt slightly overwhelmed by the fact that not only had I completed the three peaks in under 24 hours (thereby properly completing challenge number 9), but I had done the whole thing solo, which not many people can lay claim to.

As for me, I now move on to challenge number 10. Yet again I hope that my efforts inspire you to DO30, so please sponsor me and help me support 30 charities.

 Just visit: www.do30campaign.com