Ben Lawers (1214m / 3983ft), Perthshire
Ben Lawers is one of Scotland's highest summits, and stands proudly overlooking Loch Tay in Highland Perthshire. I'd first climbed it way back on my first visit to the area as a teenager, staying with the family at Kinfauns Castle. I seem to remember it was a pretty grey and wet day, but we still delighted at our achievement.
Blown away in an unsuccessful attempt
Around 25 years later I tried climbing it again, with a group of work colleagues on one of our periodic Sunday hillwalks. It was winter, with a fair amount of snow on the higher ground, and we decided to attempt it the usual way from the Visitor Centre car park.
The Visitor Centre is a handy spot with no worry about finding somewhere to park the car, but if you're starting on a climb fairly early in the day you shouldn't expect to be able to get inside to use the toilets!
This was towards the end of 1995, and I recall there were about 10 of us in the party. The start of the climb takes you along a clear, man-made path around the side of the moorland where there are many alpine species to be seen, and the National Trust for Scotland has introduced new planting of native trees to add to the diversity of habitats.
Then the track begins climbing up, quite steeply, towards the first summit of Beinn Ghlas (1103m / 3619 ft). We began to get into larger patches of snow, and this made the climbing a bit more difficult underfoot. At the top of Beinn Ghlas it was rather weird, with scarcely any wind to be felt even though it was an exposed point.
However, when we continued down to the broad mile-long ridge connecting Beinn Ghlas with the main summit of Ben Lawers, the conditions changed markedly. Suddenly there was a strong cross-wind coming up from the north-west side of the ridge - I think it was - which almost blew us over. We really struggled from there on, and found the conditions so difficult that we decided to give up and go back. It's hard to believe, now, remembering this, since there wasn't much snow on the ridge and it was only because of the strength of the cross-wind.
So it was a rather despondent bunch of us who got together in a pub down in Killin, just beyond the head of Loch Tay, for a pint afterwards. It just goes to show, you never know what to expect with the mountain weather - it can produce some remarkable conditions.
A couple of years later we attempted Ben Lawers again, with the same group give or take a few changes in personnel. This time we set out from near the Lawers Hotel, at springtime. It was a much better day, good sunshine, and mild. This route involves rather more climbing, starting from around the 200m mark, without the benefit of the car drive up to the Visitor Centre.
I remember walking up beside the Lawers Burn, passing some ruined shielings (an old settlement on summer grazings) and a rather tricky crossing point. Further up we rested at a place where the water had once been held back by a concrete barrier (is my memory playing tricks?) before we started the main, steep climb up the grassy banks of Meall Garbh (1118m / 3668 ft).
That was a long, sweaty climb, and one of our group (Chris) had his golden labrador dog accompanying us. As we puffed our way uphill the dog seemed to take it in his stride - just another exercise walk!
This first hilltop provided us with a grand resting place and a clear view across to the next peak - the more daunting prospect of An Stuc (1118m / 3668ft). It certainly lives up to its rather threatening-sounding name, being a steep triangular face of rock.
This proved to be a more challenging undertaking, with a steep climb up among the rocks first of all, before reaching a Bad Step which involved some stretching of arms and legs to get up, around and over a big rock without much to hang onto. At this point the dog had a bit of difficulty, and I recall someone pulled a rope from a rucksack to tie round him to help him up.
From there it's not much further up to the top, with plenty of space to relax and recover and feel relieved to get the Bad Step behind us.
The next section was much easier, down and over a subsidiary peak then up to Ben Lawers, so this time we achieved our objective.
What I can't quite remember is how we got back down to the cars - did we find a way down which missed out An Stuc? I don't recall going back over it.
The Third Attempt (also successful) - a run over the tops
Another couple of years after that, a different bunch of us from work had organised an all-day relay event combining mountain-biking, canoeing, and hill walking, from St Fillans on Loch Earn, over the hills on the north side of the loch, with a cycle up towards Killin, then another hill crossing over Meall Clachach, a section over the Tarmachans, and a final leg from the Visitor Centre over Ben Lawers and down to Lawers Hotel. It was a training event for the Hebridean Challenge, which did much the same thing over a period of 4 days from Barra to the Butt of Lewis.
I'd already done a couple of the earlier, shorter cross-country legs, and was then facing the prospect of the final section over Ben Lawers. It was the thought of finding my way down An Stuc that was worrying me, recalling the awkward step from that previous climb.
John had conquered the Tarmachans, and hurried back down to the Visitor Centre. I was ready to take the batton for the final leg. Now this was when I was reasonably fit, and was able to get into a very steady pace to climb the steep rocky steps up to Beinn Ghlas, then dash on to Ben Lawers which was hidden in cloud.
At one point I initially took the wrong turning off one of the tops - maybe it was Ben Lawers itself - and fortunately had doubts a little way along the ridge. A little less haste! Taking the wrong route of descent from a summit like this could have landed me way down in Glen Lyon, many miles off route. So I took my time to check the position and retraced my steps to the top, then found the right route onwards.
After that, An Stuc proved to be much less of an obstacle than I had expected, and I managed to slither down from one hand-hold to the next toe-hold, and get back on my feet for the dash downwards. On that occasion I was able to miss out Meall Garbh, dropping down from the bealach to the banks of Lochan nan Cat then continuing down by the Lawers Burn.
The best hillrunners have a great ability to shuffle their feet down steep slopes at great speed, seemingly oblivious to the slippery nature of the hillside. But that needs a lot of self-confidence and piston-like legs! I just have to take it carefully on the steep bits and then try to get into some sort of fast stride on the easier downhill sections. There's always the risk of damaging the knees from too enthusiastic a descent, quite apart from slipping and landing heavily on a sharp rock!
Anyway, it was an exhilarating experience, and I found a route down to the Lawers Hotel and we weren't disgraced. The loch was gorgeous in the evening sunshine and we really enjoyed our bowl of soup and a pint before heading back to our homes that evening. Well done to the organiser, Dave Broni, for putting the event together..
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