When thinking of somewhere to have a long weekend away, the Scottish highlands don’t usually spring to mind. Yes, at times it can seem as though anything further north of St Andrews is akin to going beyond-the-wall and into wilding territory (Game of Thrones for those of you who aren’t part of the fandom – and why not??). But I spent last weekend camping in deepest darkest central Scotland with the university’s mountaineering club and, incredibly, didn’t freeze to death or encounter any wild locals.
The weekend began 15 of us piling into two mini vans and heading off toward the darkening hills. We were bound for Glen Coe – one of the most beautiful and picturesque valleys in Scotland about 2 and a half hours away.
Our first point of call was the Tyndrum Fish and Chip shop. Maybe it’s something to do with the fact that most people who stop there are tired and muddy walkers who’ve spent a day in the mountains, but this fish and chip shop has a legendary status. As we pulled into the car park the lights were glowing like a thousand fairies. We all eagerly jumped out, ready to have a large portion of something deep fat fried.
There was something wrong. Someone had turned the lights out in the restaurant and the door was being locked. It had just closed. We were devastated. Without fish and chips, what could we possibly eat?
Morose, we got back in the van and headed to our campsite. As the rain began to fall more heavily, I questioned our sanity.
But things looked brighter when I arrived at the campsite to find the other van had arrived early and my boyfriend had already pitched our tent. Man points were awarded. I consoled myself about the lack of chips with a bar of chocolate and went to sleep.
The next day, myself and a few friends headed off to complete two more Munros. A Munro is a Scottish mountain over 3000 ft. There are 282 official Munros in Scotland and “munro-bagging” is a popular ambition for many hill walkers. Although the low mist meant we couldn’t see the top of the valley, it was relatively warm (for Scotland) and the conditions seemed OK to tackle the Aonach Eagach ridge – a 10 km ridge which would link the Munros we planned to bag.
However as we ascended the weather took a turn for the worse as is typical in the Scottish highlands and we were soon struggling against strong winds, horizontal rain and visibility of about 100 yards. But we’d come this far and didn’t want to turn back. The ridge itself was very slippery with drops of about 600 ft to either side. Not looking down (more due to the dense cloud) we completed the ridge and our second Munro before quickly descending and hitching a lift to the pub.
That evening we regrouped with the rest of our friends and headed to the King’s House to warm up with a few casual drinks and a game of cards. This turned into me deciding to open a tab and leave my card behind the bar. In a room of about 30 locals and 20 students this was perhaps not the greatest idea. As last drinks were called, we all stumbled in various degrees of drunkenness back to our tents.
I was awoken at about 3 am by a wet tent on my face. The wind and rain were whistling down the valley and hitting our tent like a freight train. As I heard the wind pick up even more I huddled down under my sleeping bag and tried to get back to sleep. At which point our tent presently decided to collapse. The rest of the night was spent with my boyfriend and I holding up the tent with our hands. The next morning dawned grey and miserable.
But we were St Andrews Mountaineering Club, and weren’t to be defeated by a bit of wet. So we ate breakfast, packed up and headed off to do a bit of climbing on a roadside crag. We soon discovered that the word “roadside” in a guidebook should be taken with a great big spoonful of salt. After walking for about an hour and forging a river, we arrived at a soaking, overgrown gully wall, which looked like no one had ever even considered climbing there. After watching one member of the club abseil down and then walk back up, we decided to head home.
My weekend may not have gone all that smoothly (or dryly), I may not ever have felt entirely warm and I may have been used as fine dining by all of Scotland’s midges, but I still had a great time. The charms of Blighty are often overshadowed by the allure of warmer climes, but we really do live in a beautiful country and its quirks are what, in my opinion, make it great.