Note
Attempted Cuillin Traverse.
This obviously isn't a run but I decided that I would like to write it up as it was a pretty significant and memorable day on the ridge. Feel free to skip, but it is rather amusing at points.
Grace and I had decided that we would like to do a traverse of the Cuillin ridge at some point this summer and both managed to secure some money from our respective colleges to help pay for a guide. We set a date, found Mehmet Karatay (who's also in BASOC!) as our guide, and did a few stunning days of single munros in July as I logged on here.
Doing stuff like the Aonach Eagach and the via ferrata at Kinlochleven was also partly preparation for this - I love scrambling and light climbing but I am not a massive fan of exposure so have been making a concerted effort over the past few months to push through that, which has gone well.
Our weather window for this didn't look brilliant so we settled on attempting to do the entire ridge as a one day traverse. We met up with Mehmet and sorted things out before heading to Glenbrittle.
Woke up at 3.40am and almost instantly had a rather sinking feeling when I saw how windy it was. Anyway, we set off at 4.30 and made decent progress in the dark towards and up into the corrie below the southern munros. Started raining pretty heavily at this point so it was waterproofs on and plough on. Really enjoyed the scree climb to the ridge and then it was a short hop out to Sgurr Dubh Mor with some decent but pretty easy sections of scrambling (we missed out Sgurr nan Eag cos we already did it and thought it would hinder our chances of getting further). Bear in mind for all of this we had about 15-20m of visibility.
As we headed over to Sgurr Alasdair I was kinda worried that my hands were getting a bit cold (they're kinda important on the ridge!) but they managed to warm up again once I put on another layer and pulled my waterproof hood over my climbing helmet - absolute game changer.
Really enjoyed climbing up Alasdair - some decent scrambling and exposure. We were making decent time at this point but after this point the ridge changes to basalt, which makes it extremely slippy when wet. Naturally, this massively reduced our pace as we had to be really careful on any slabs of rock. We were on the rope a lot by this point and were working well together, even if I did nearly pull Grace off a cliff at one point - my bad.
We then did some proper roped up climbing to get over Sgurr Thearlaich - I actually found the descent harder. I'm not a massive fan of downclimbing, particularly when wet, but Grace usually went first so she could spot me which was helpful. Weather was still rainy, foggy and just maste wet.
It was really important to maintain discipline in terms of eating, layering up, etc during the day cos it was such an effort that inevitably led you to being temporarily colder. But we are pretty experienced when it comes to rubbish weather so we had this part nailed!
The next part of the ridge was along Collie's ledge (the path halfway up a massive cliff that Danny Macaskill cycled along). It was a bit sketchy at the start but got better as we went on. Then the nip to the top of the third munro from there was no bother.
By this point we had been out for about 9-10 hours and were obviously aware that due to the conditions we were nowhere near being able to finish. But we did hope we could do Banachdich or maybe even the two beyond it.
Lots of descent and ascent followed, including walking up what was effectively a waterfall at one point - rope was useful here!
So, we arrived at the base of the In Pinn. I had been massively toing and froing in my head over whether I wanted to do it. I knew Grace wanted to (what a surprise) and I just wasn't sure. As always it was a case of the angel and the demon pulling you one direction and the other. But the bottom line was; I wanted to do it, I knew I could, Mehmet said it was safe even in these conditions, and I knew I would kick myself so hard if I didn't do it! So with that I committed.
Once Mehmet climbed up and set up the ropes, I went first with Grace close behind. This required pretty serious co-operation between the two of us, which was kind of hard in the howling wind but we managed. I just focussed on looking straight ahead and not thinking about the bloody massive drop on either side. There is a crux move in the first part which was rather tricky but got it alright. The second section was narrower but easier and I just pushed on again - I mean, what else was I supposed to do!
Made it to the top which was an incredible feeling. Felt so gassed to have done it, particularly given the circumstances. The problem was, we then had to abseil down. The wind was gusting at 40mph at this point (Mehmet even said that if he'd realised how windy it would be at the top we wouldn't have gone up!) and we just had to sit there for 10 minutes (felt like about 10 years), facing into the wind, whilst he set it up. Was honestly so so cold - just felt like I was sticking my head in an icy washing machine. Would have happily cried at this point, but that would've been unhelpful, so I didn't.
Abseiled down the first part with Mehmet - I made a right pig's ear of it because of the wind and I was not really trusting the rope. He decided it would be easier to just go down directly above him for the second part - no complaints from me!
Once we got down we'd been out for 12.5 hours and were really really really cold. We were shivering any time we stopped and this was even when I was wearing 4 pairs of trousers and 7 tops/waterproofs! We decided not to do Banachdich and headed down for home straight for here.
We lost some time on the descent trying to find the safe way down into the corrie in the fog, but made it eventually.
At this point, for the first time in 12 hours, we had some visibility. Yay! Once we were clear of any scrambling we got the helmets and harnesses off and set off on the easy walk back to the glen. Made it back in 15 hours and 5 minutes - what an epic!
Although we didn't go nearly as far as expected, I have absolutely no regrets in relation to what we did or didn't do. Other guides Mehmet spoke to were amazed we did what we did in that weather and it still felt like a very full day of walking/scrambling/climbing.
Will have to come back some time in the future to tick off the 4 we still haven't done. But it's fair to say I won't be returning to the In Pinn for a while. In that moment (and at some other points) I was extremely glad we had zero visibility - being able to see the sheer drops at that point may have led to potential trouser accidents.
So glad to have done this - an amazing experience, like no other I've ever had in the mountains. Doing it guided was absolutely invaluable and made so much of it so much easier. Need a wee rest now though - my watch said I burnt 4700 calories on Monday, not bad considering I never even broke into a run...!