I didn’t really sleep the night before we were to go up Ben Nevis. By the time Craig and I got to bed, there were only about three hours available to sleep; in the afternoon, I went to the pub to plough through some work I needed to focus on, and, among the things I bought to pay for my long stay there were two coffees. So when it was time to sleep, I lay there the whole time with wild dreams going through my head — every real or imagined place in my life played out there, it seemed — but even though I was dreaming, my brain would just not give up the ghost, you might say.
Eventually, the alarm went off. We packed up all our stuff and went out into the square, where the neighbours were walking a relay around the park through the night. Someone had set up a marquee tent, bunting hung back and forth across the square, and smoke tumbled from a small drum with a fire in it. Our neighbour Lorna, the powerhouse organiser behind this whole event, met us in flannel pyjamas, housecoat, and curlers with an unlit cigarette hanging from her mouth — this was her costume, and it wasn’t too different from her husband David’s! She offered us cullen skink, but I’d just had cereal, because it seemed right to treat this as the start of the day rather than the middle of the night.
We met James and Ian, the other two neighbours who were making the climb with us, piled into Ian’s car, and drove off into the middle of the night. My usual ‘carcolepsy’ kicked in, and I slept for most of the four-hour drive.
The sky was beginning to lighten as we arrived, and Nevis loomed overhead. We parked at the visitors’ centre and loaded ourselves up. The morning was cool, so I bundled up in every layer I’d brought.
Pretty soon, I’d taken most of it off again, because the first part of the climb was a gruelling, seemingly endless walk up a trail that felt more like an inclined riverbed. I’d brought enough snacks to last the whole day, thinking that would make life easier, but at this point I had that cold, clammy, almost-nauseous feeling that comes with suddenly having a lot of exercise of a sort you’re not accustomed to. Craig and I stopped for a drink and a rest, not speaking it but sharing a doubt that we could keep this up all day. But there was no way we would stop, so we kept on.
Lorna and David had given us walking sticks, which I’d taken along even though I’d always thought they were a silly affectation. Now I understood how valuable they were! What a help it was, being able to use them to push myself up a rock with my arms rather than just having to do all the lifting with my legs.
Then the path suddenly got smooth and even, and the scenery opened up, too. We walked around a valley and looked out in awe over the Great Glen.
As difficult as this was, I was having fun — partly because I was determined to, and partly because the whole thing was, at this point, my choice to do. I had all these notions of what the climb would mean, and even made these little cards to remind me of the metaphoric stuff it was supposed to be about:
…But the day turned out to be just about what it was about, doing a thing and seeing some stuff. And that was plenty.
We continued on and reached a third section of the trail — which wasn’t simply a natural trail, but one that had been gritted and gravelled and paved with huge rocks. The work involved in that beggared belief, and I was grateful, yet I’m not really sure it made the climb easier. In this third bit, the path turned into a kind of huge, uneven stone staircase, like climbing the stairs of a Mayan ruin. It went on and on, providing better and better views of the hills and valleys around us, like a mossy crown with water in the middle.
But lifting my head was only an occasional indulgence, because every footstep had to be placed just right.
The weather was forecast to be wet and miserable all day, but thankfully that was wrong. (Since moving to the Highlands, I’ve come to expect that the weather forecast will always be wrong — besides which, it changes so often that describing a whole day as having one “weather” is wildly inadequate.)
Still, the higher we got, the colder it grew, and we had to put on more layers. As we reached the top, the ground turned to gravel, which made for another period of gruelling progress, as the shifting ground stole away most of our walking effort.
We switched back again and again on the way up (occasionally passed by mad army-folk who ran or walked briskly down with little gear, suggesting that they’d somehow ascended in the dark; I still don’t understand how that could be possible). Then cloud settled around us and we seemed to be in a grey netherworld. Piled-up cones of large rocks — cairns — added to the feeling that we’d entered a Celtic or Norse limbo.
I’d told myself beforehand that I wouldn’t bother with “Are we there yet?”-type thoughts, but would just take the climb moment by moment. I knew the cairns marked the top, but had been warned that the top isn’t where you think it is, it’s further. So, with my feet sliding on the gravel, I kept digging my poles in and walking until we all gathered at a plaque on a small plinth. But even that turned out to not be the official geographic top — that was slightly further along. So we clambered onto that and had our picture taken by some of the others who’d arrived.
By this point, more and more people were appearing at the top, many of them dressed completely inadequately for the frigid weather up there. Groups of these young people showed up, along with the odd weathered and fit sole climber wearing fitness gear, who promptly turned around and ran back off once they’d arrived.
We sat in the rubble-ruins of one of the buildings from the old observation post that was once at the peak, and we ransacked our rucksacks, eating sandwiches and granola bars and fruit, guzzling water and energy drinks.
Then we made our way back down. It was no easier, though we did it faster (3:15 up, 2:50 down). Again, the poles we indispensable, helping us gain surer footing and keep us from destroying our knees and shins.
The closer we got to the bottom, the more people were on their way up — which made for some awkward passing places, and also made us look at each other in disbelief at some of the outfits people had on for the climb, such as the couple who looked like young Italian models in their tight jeans, or the middle-aged couple in T-shirts and shorts who were both as round as teapots, the families with young children and dogs (the dogs were having no problem, though I wondered how the Jack Russell with the bad leg doing step, step, step, hop was going to make it up the giant Mayan stairs), and older couples in city clothes, her with her purse like they were just going out shopping. I wonder how many of those people actually made it to the top.
By the time I was back on level ground, I was knackered. As I teetered forward on two sticks, my legs were no longer able to move up and down, no matter how much I tried to will them forward. I had new sympathy for what it must be like for my dad when his Parkinson’s medication wears off.
We got back to the car, patched up our blisters and changed our damp clothing, then, in proper Scottish fashion, drove to the nearest pub.
On the way home, the car hit a boulder that had rolled out of a stone wall onto the road, which bounced one side of the car into the air, then we landed and bounced off the wall, decimating the wing-mirror, scraping the side of the car, and splitting and bending the front tyre. Thanks to Ian’s handling of the car, we were fine. After a wait for Roadside Assistance, we were headed home, driven along the swerving, calamitously steep coastal roads at crazy speed by a foul-mouthed, racist, older English man who hinted at having a sketchy past.
Finally, we arrived back in Argyle Square, just in time to join the walking relay for their final lap. It was torture, forcing my legs forward, but we made it, and all finished the event together.
That evening was also the opening of the Wick Gala, and, as happens each year, decorated floats passed through the square. We weren’t prepared, so one of the neighbours gave Craig and I a bag of 2-pence coppers to throw at the floats, which collected money for various projects around town (mostly the schools, it seemed).
Then we all retired to Lorna and David’s lush back garden, where we sat in a circle on folding lawn-chairs, chatting, having drinks, then eating Indian take-away when it arrived. Craig and I felt really welcomed by the whole group, and soon Lorna was cooking up plans for us all to go camping together.
I can see when Craig is starting to fade, and I knew I was tired, so after a while we excused ourselves to go home. I’d been having to move my legs manually all evening, since I couldn’t lift them, like some TV movie paraplegic, so getting out of my lawn-chair was a challenge. But oh, after a shower to clean off the sweat and grit, did it ever feel nice to slip into bed!
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