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Published: August 16th 2006
On Saturday I climbed through the mist and the slanting rain to the 1,344 metre summit of Ben Nevis, my 92nd and final mountain. The summit is the coldest place in Britain with a mean temperature of 0.3C and is scaled by 100,000 people a year. If the tourist track to the top is a motorway then the summit is a service station, the highest picnic area in Britain. After so many lonely summits it was odd to be surrounded by dozens of people.
Ben Nevis may be the biggest but it's certainly not the baddest. Yet the people who walk up reminded me of watching the London Marathon - folk who are totally unprepared for the challenge. Bodies lay strewn either side of the path gasping for air asking if they were nearly there. Somehow these daytrippers, like the marathon, drag themselves to the summit, regardless of the time it takes. And you know what, they'll probably never climb a mountain again.
I clambered up the final few stone steps to the trig point, the highest person in the UK. Elated, relieved and immensely satisfied. I had seen it out and dared to turn my dream into a
reality. Thank goodness I didn't sit at a desk all summer. I find it hard to imagine that I once believed I was doing the wrong thing.
I cycled 4,405 miles in 305 hours, climbed 92 moors, wolds, hills and mountains, 500 miles of walking and 55,000 metres of ascent.
The three days before I reached Ben Nevis were the most challenging I have ever faced. On Wednesday I cycled a heroic 73 miles in 35 mph winds. I have never known anything like it. The strength of the wind was shocking, blasting me head-on meant I travelled at a snail's pace. Or worse, to the side, which made balancing with panniers very difficult. Add to that the wicked gust of air which is caused by lorries thundering past in the opposite direction, cycling was very dangerous. I was happy just to fall off the once, cracking my knee on the kerb. At least I fell towards the verge rather than into the road.
On Thursday I rode an easier 65 miles but had to contend with the huge Munro Carn Eige. Then Friday a monstrous 87 mile ride down the Great Glen to Glen Coe followed
by a four-hour trek. And all the time I was desparately tired. The fatigue was overwhelming. Nutrition has been a problem. I could no longer eat enough to match the calories I was burning. Since I went to Northern Ireland I was on the road for 25 consecutive days which took its toll. I stayed with an old Cheltenham housemate Laura in Airdrie five weeks ago. Then I weighed 11st 1lb. Now my weight has dipped to 10st 4lbs.
My experiences on Carn Eige represented the worst of everything I have ever felt. It was a day I learned to respect the dangers of mountains. The problem with working to a deadline was that I had to climb the mountain no matter what the weather held in store. This meant taking risks and gambling with the conditions. Foreigners visit our mountains and assume they are easy. They have climbed Alps, see a mountain twice as small and assume it holds no problems. But the northerly latitude of the Scottish mountains makes them susceptible to freak changes. In a single day I saw brilliant sunshine, freezing mist, torrential rain, gale-force winds and hailstorms.
I was so exhausted that I
was almost sleepwalking on the long walk-in to Carn Eige. But adrenaline and fear is the ultimate wake up call. The weather was at its very worst. The mountain was coated in thick black mist and it was pouring with rain. For the first time I dreaded the conditions. I had to climb up to a precarious ridge where I knew the wind would be horrendous, where I would have to fight to stay on my feet. Half an hour on the ridge I reached the awful Carn Eige, lonely, isolated and black in every direction.
In my haste I descended due north instead of south. Ten minutes of going the wrong way I had the horrible realisation that I was badly off course. I could feel panic rising in my stomach. But I worked my way back to the summit and this time headed south. Again I lost the track and descended east along another ridge for a mile. I was caught in two minds. Do I turn back? Or press on not knowing if the ridge ended in cliffs or sloped down to the valley?
I continued on for another half hour and for a magical few
seconds the mist vanished revealing the mountainside. It looked so tame in the light. But moments later it was gone. I gradually dropped off the ridge and joyously out of the mist. A perfect rainbow lay in Glen Affric below. It was wonderful that there was such calm below such turmoil on the summit.
I have faced every challenge imaginable. Climbed a hill called Brown Willy. Slept in the same room as the filthiest smelling man in Britain in Somerset - by midnight my head was out the window gasping for air. Propositioned by a male Austrian architect in Surrey. Ventured into a back garden to find Kent's county top. Suffered four puctures in 50 miserable Home Counties miles. The wettest May for 27 years. Had a tantrum on Milk Hill, famed for its crop circles, because I couldn't fix my bike. Attacked by a dog in Shropshire. Asked if I would need oxygen on Ben Nevis (by a journalist - shameful). Repeatedly mistaken for an Argentine cyclist. Ate a lorry-load of biscuits. Heat exhaustion and sunstroke in the Brecon Beacons.
Wild camping. Reached the lowest county top, Boring Field (80 metres), Huntingdonshire. Joined a time trial in
Cheshire. Epic 100-mile day from Cambridge to Sheringham. Smashed through a metal toll barrier in Nottinghamshire. Bike fell to pieces - tires, wheels, brake pads replaced. 'That' Scrabble game - Irishman tried to put whores and wogs down on the board but persuaded me to go to Northern Ireland. Wonderful sunny day on Scafell Pike in hot sun - raced off the mountain to the pub for England's losing quarter-final. Cycled the hardest passes in Britain - Hardknott and Wrynose in the Lake District. Waded the Tees. Crossed deep into a MoD firing range - with the red flag flying. Thought The Cheviot would be an eight-mile walk, 15 awful starving miles later... Consumed several million calories during a weekend in Airdrie. Tent blown away in a storm.
Home for a successful job interview. Featured in the Sunday Herald. Slept in a ferry terminal, in a children's soft play area, waiting for the dawn Northern Ireland ferry - savaged by midges. Five day loop of Ulster. 1,000 lightning strikes in a single day in Antrim. Plantation on Slieve Gullion went up in smoke. Telling someone what I'm doing - 100th person to say "like that Tony Hawks who went
round Ireland with a fridge". Rode the two highest road passes in Britain. Billions of midges lie in wait while I sat out a storm in my tent in the Cairngorms. July - the hottest month since records began and three heatwaves. Trespassing on private grouse moor in Moray. BBC Hereford & Worcester interviewed me live on their breakfast programme. I was introduced over the music, "Ain't no mountain high enough, ain't no valley low enough..." Lost on the summit of Ben More Assynt. Emergency sea rescue on the Orkney ferry. Sixth nose peels off. The almost martian Ronas Hill on Shetland, most northerly point, 60 degrees. Lost my camera on Orkney. 35 mph winds across Caithness. 70,000 metres of cycle ascent eight times up Everest. 10 punctures, three wheels and four tyres worn out, two sets of brake pads. Made the front page of the Bromsgrove Advertiser.
And a million little things and conversations I'll always remember.
The journey lasted 92 days, including 15 rest days. Where I stayed: hostels, 34 nights, camping, 22, friends and family 14, hotel 2, ferries 2, pub, bothy, bunkhouse, 1 each.
I have touched every corner of the UK. Some of the county tops are revered to the point of ruin. Places where restaurants, ski runs, towers, weather observatories, reservoirs, radio transmitters, roads and railways have cut into the landscape. Others lie hidden and obscure. High summits that are attainable only by the determined walker, or so secret that no paths visit their summit. They pop up in back gardens, a bend in the road, farmer’s fields, private grouse moors and military firing zones. They were once ancient hill forts, henges, burial and sacrifice sites and beacons.
I'm proud to have achieved something that hasn't been done before.
What now? I have taken a journalism job and start in three-and-half weeks. In the mean time I am writing as much up as possible and will try and pitch the idea to a publisher. And quite seriously if anyone knows anything about, or anyone involved in, publishing, let me know. Thank you for all your support. Until Keighley to Kathmandu.....
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Rach H (Echo)
non-member comment
Congrats
I think you should call your book "Jonny Dangerous." Well done!