Beinn Eunaich – Beinn a Chochuill – Stob Diamh – Ben Cruachan

10 miles, 1260m ascent, 9 hours 40 mins

The morning seemed a breeze after the toil of the previous afternoon with fine ridge walking being followed by a steep descent then a grade I gully on to the ridge.  Ben managed very well in my instep crampons, although the steepening slopes near the cornice made him a little fearful and I had to cut steps for him.  Unfortunately, with little distance between me and him (I use a sling attached to a climbing belt to secure him), I spiked him in the head with my crampons, but it doesn't seem to have doen him any lasting damage!  he was elated on reaching the ridge, on what for him was a real climb.  we looked forward to great ridge-walking in the sunshine, but much to my disappointment the cloud rolled in and we spent the rest of the day wreathed in mist.

The ridge to Cruachan provided reasonable sport in the conditions, with one step proving decidedly awkward for Ben.  We were clearly going to be late for the scheduled meeting with Alison at the Falls of Cruachan Car park so I left a phone message saying that we'd be an hour later than the scheduled 4.30 rendezvous, having previously texted to amend the original meeting time of 12.30pm.  In the event it took us even longer than that as Ben tired on the final steep descent to the car park.  So at 6pm on a cold winter's evening we arrived at the car park to find it completely devoid of cars and no Alison in sight.  having looked forward to meeting his Mum after four exceptionally arduous days, Ben promptly burst in to tears and sobbed out where was she?  i could only reply that I had no idea whatsoever.  We had no mobile reception; no-one was around and the only civilisation for miles was a lone house by the station.  I extracted the last donut from the rucksack in an effort to raise ben's spirits, waited 10 minutes then walked over to the house.  Fortunately someone was at home and I explained our predicament.  I tried Alison on their phone but only got a message on the answerphone.  In desperation I phoned my Mum and Dad to see if Alison had contacted them but only succeeded in worrying them.  As I sipped the welcome tea that our kind hosts had provided, I couldn't share ben's apparent acceptance of the situation as I was beginning to worry that something serious had happened to alison.  What else could have prevented her from meeting or even contacting us?  I was just about to don my boots again to try to hitch down the road at 7pm on a dark winter's night with a 6 year old, when Alison made an entre and promptly burst in to tears.  Apparently she had never picked up my text from the previous day, nor either of my phone messages so Alison had been waiting and worrying herself to a frenzy since 12.30.  The car park was closed with a barrier but Ben and I hadn't seen this as we'd taken a short-cut to the corner of the car park.  We didn't therefore walk down the road to where Alison had been waiting in a lay-by, nor did we see her as it was dark.  She had to try 5 miles up the road to get any reception but didn't want to leave her parking spot in case we arrived and mised her.  Eventually she had driven to Dalmally and had picked up my last desparate message from the house.  The moral of the story - don't rely on mobiles!

Photos