First up was Narrinder and friends on Saturday morning. They were preparing for a 3 Peaks Challenge event in about 3 weeks time. Realising they would be ascending Scafell Pike during the hours of darkness, they had the forethought to visit the mountain ahead of the challenge date in order to familiarise themselves with the terrain and spend the day doing some valuable training.
We ascended from Wasdale and stayed on the Lingmel Col route throughout, as this is the 3 Peaks route. We had a lot of fun and laughs throughout the day. Some knee pain experienced too! Overall a good day which I hope proves very useful for the event.
Later the same day, well close to midnight actually, I was back in Wasdale. This time meeting Claire and her team of 6 walkers completing the 3 Peaks Challenge. Their time on Ben Nevis had been a little over 5 hours, so pretty good. When they arrived in Wasdale, everyone was ready within minutes, clearly a well oiled machine of a team, nice one.
We ascended quickly into the thick mist of Hollowstones. Navigating on the summit plateau proved to be a challenge as the mist became ever denser, but with considered progress we didn't put a foot wrong.
We arrived back in the valley a little after sunrise and bacon butties welcomed us, this was an unexpected and much appreciated treat, thanks to George & Don for this.
Time for Scafell Pike was 4 hours 25 minutes, good going team.
The importance of training and preparation:
This weekends teams highlight the importance of proper training over a prolonged period. Narrinder and friends are taking the event seriously and spending time and effort to prepare for what is a tough event. With sufficient training good results can be achieved. Claire's team have clearly worked hard to prepare and that hard work has paid off, with good times for the mountains. But they have also considered their route and schedule carefully and tried hard to minimise faff time at the beginning / end of each mountain, thus saving much time.
Lovely to meet you all
Mark
