DAY 3 - CLIMBING BEN NEVIS

I was woken up around 6:50 this morning by people rolling out of their extremely squeaky beds. Not great after a group of Korean lads did their best to wake everyone up at about 23:30 last night, clattering about.

I had my breakfast of porridge before Mackie arrived soon after 8:00. We made our sandwiches and got our stuff together ready for the climb.

The youth hostel is quite literally metres over the road from the path up to the mountain.

We set off at 9:00 prepared for a long climb. Poor Mackie. After about 20 minutes, he realised how unfit he really is. After 45 minutes, he was sweating cobs, saying that he had seriously underestimated the climb and didn’t think he’d be able to complete this mountain, let alone Scafell Pike and Snowdon.

After many stops and a lot of persuasion, we finally made it to the summit four hours after setting off. We had a half hour lunch stop in the ruined observatory at the top, admiring the cloud that had engulfed us by this point.

We made the long descent down and finally got to the bottom at 16:00. Considering Mackie was on the verge of quitting many times on the way up, I was glad and proud that he had made it, even if legs said otherwise!

The weather for the climb was beautiful, with the exception of the cloud at the top which ruined any chance of getting a view from there.

The climb itself, I thought, was quite boring really. Just a set-stone path most of the way up, with the exception of the views from the mountain side, I felt confined to stay on the path at all times with nowhere to just go for a sit down a little bit away from all the human traffic buzzing up and down the Nevis highway.

Having arrived back at the hostel, I had a shower then met up with Aussie Dave again, so had a chat and a coffee for an hour before Mackie came back to the hostel from his Travelodge.

We drove over to see Neptune’s Staircase, an engineering feat of several canal locks in a long run, one after the other. I’m amazed how someone could actually come up with an idea like that, back in the day. The brilliance of the human mind!

After grabbing some tea, it was back to the hostel to sort my stuff out for my next stage of cycling tomorrow.

Oh, an update on my knee……..it’s buggered!!! I had problems with it most of the way up and down Nevis. I just hope adrenaline and stubbornness gets me through to the end. Fingers crossed!

Looking forward to a good night’s kip tonight…….