Evening bloggers!
Well we did walk 500 miles and still in one piece to tell the tale! What a weekend. Many, many thanks to all the blog team for their heroic efforts last week; Lorna, Alex, Ian, Tim, Mike, Alex, Duncan, Kevin , Philip, Jonathan, Chris, Campbell, Colin and Robert and our fantastic support team of Jim, Gerry, Nora, Michelle, Debi and Ivana.
G had sorted out all the logistics and got us all and cars and drivers to the Pasta party at Fort William on the Friday night where we got registered and stocked up on carbs and waited in anticipation for the safety briefing. It was worth the wait! We got shouted at by an extreme person called Fox-pit or fox-trot or something with fox or Pitt in it who over emphasised every 4th word and informed us that he had undertaken much more difficult challenges than the Monster. (Inspiring!!!not). Then he barked out all the essential equipment you would need in order to complete the Gold stage (strangely enough there was no mention of Cremola foam and Green flash shoes) and yes the dreaded walking poles were mentioned....along with a large tub of vaseline and drinking 4 litres of water every hour just to survive the bike ride. If you made it to the hiking stage you then had to run the gauntlet of highland doctors who might ask you general knowledge questions or even the 9 times table (to help weed out those who weren't taking it seriously). The doctors (according to Fox-Pitt) had the power to remove you from the event and put you in the black tent. In addition, we were also told that "Special forces" were operating on the overnight stage to Inverness and would be "helping people in difficulty" up on the mountains. This was all beginning to sound rather alarming (and we thought we were just on a staightforward charity hike!).
We bolstered ourselves with some team talk at Loch Lochy youth hostel that evening and decided that Ian should be the first to tackle the roving doctors as he was confident with the 9 times table and could say "Good morning" in Polish. Lorna and I did not get much sleep as we had some people in our dorm who apparently were not getting up at 5am to walk to Inverness and so felt the need to stay up all night giggling and chatting and going to the toilet etc (thats young people for you).... So up at 5am and to the start for 6am to get shouted at again by Fox Pitt who at least this time was only telling us where to get bacon butties. There were lots of rather fit looking chaps in lycra circling the car park, a bit like chariots of fire doing some quite exhibitionist things with a tub of vaseline (is that really necessary!). I have to say that there were not so many middle aged women but we tried not to get too intimidated. Then we were under starters orders and off..........
One of the things that Fox-Pitt failed to mention on his safety brief was to tell people which side to pass on with the bikes so inevitably there was a lot of bunching and crunching at the start and I think one or 2 early casualties for the diving team patrolling the canal. The blog team got a bit dispersed at this stage with most of the boys setting off at a good pace with Lorna and I taking our time to enjoy the scenery on the way. We lost Duncan at one point who was following a rather gorgeous lycra clad babe, apparently with visible thong, who turned out to be rather a serious mountain biker so Duncan made good time over this section. The off-road biking bit was bit more severe than we had thought and we did pass some casualties along the way. Lorna and I were quite glad to finish the biking section at Fort Augustus and Gerry and Jim were there with porridge and coffee and a change of gear.
So we set off to Invermoriston, by this time an hour or 2 behind the boys where Alex and Ian were up front having set a blistering pace on the bikes. Invermoriston turned out to be rather hard to reach as the sound of the band playing in the town hall kept coming in and out of earshot and we seemed to be walking around and around it and never quite getting there, a bit like trying to find Brigadoon. Then on the way out we seemed to take forever walking on a zig-zag route along forest tracks and still we could see the town below. Eventually we put Invermoriston behind us and headed towards Drummnadrochit!
Luckily I have never been any good at reading maps so I had no idea what was ahead. However, Lorna and I heard a few expletives from Duncan who could read a map who would cheer us up with" Do you want the bad news or the really bad news!" He could teach Fox Pitt a thing or 2 on morale raising behaviour. So we climbed higher and higher (lovely views of Loch Ness) and tramped on towards Drummnadrochit having chats along with the way with some of the other Monster participants. A long slog into Drum at around 9pm and it was beginning to get dark and threatening rain. It was lovely to see Debi and the kids and the rest of the support team who were waiting to welcome us with hot drinks and some food. We also got news of the others as we were the back stops of the team. Alex and Ian were still upfront and had Inverness in their sights. The others had all set off for the gold stage and Philip had pushed on even though his knee was bothering him. We stopped to change gear again and get some food before setting off accross the hills to Inverness. Duncan got his blisters treated and managed to recite enough of the 9 times table to be allowed out again so we pressed on into the night with torches for the last 20 miles.
There was a real ****ard of a hill just outside Drum which was really steep and quite relentless. Luckily it was dark at this point and you could only see a few feet in front of you with head torches so you had no idea what was ahead. Eventually we got to the top and found the tent with Teas, coffee etc. We were told that that was the worst bit and that it was easy to get to Inverness after this (hmm... easy, comprised a 15 mile slog accross the hill top in the rain, wind and dark trying to avoid the Special Forces, wolves and several crocodiles that Duncan and I stumbled upon in our delerium. At this stage we would have quite welcomed sight of the doctors and the Black tent but they had all rather sensibly gone home for the night. In fact every time we got to a water stop they were about to pack up shop and head home and we were sure there were people still behind us! At this stage we had to force ourselves to keep eating and drinking as you were so tired you didn't feel like it at all. Duncan's blisters had taken over his whole foot and although I did offer amputation as an option (knowing the Special forces were at hand) he prefered drugs instead. Eventually, we saw the lights of Inverness in the dawn which lifted our spirits considerably. We walked on in a meditative trance for a few miles and then Inverness got closer and closer and the next thing we knew Avril and Jill were waiting to meet us before we got to the Aquadrome and THE END!!!!Hooray.
Avril drove us back to her house and we collapsed for a few hours sleep before catching up with everyone else later on and we had a great celebration that evening in RocPool in Inverness.
The fundraising has been fantastic and we have smashed through our original target and it is still growing! Thank you all so much for participating in this either by doing it or helping to support the team and by fundraising it is for a great cause. The biggest boost for the whole team was having Gerry there with us, just a few weeks post-transplant. He is keen to do The Monster next year...so if any of you want to sign up again......
9 x 3 is 29
good night
Deputy Blogger
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment