The Three Peaks Challenge by Simon Heptinstall
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I was scared, exhausted and alone on top of Britain’s highest mountain in a 70mph blizzard.
Deadly precipices lurked either side of the path, invisible through the minus-eight degree white-out. All I could see was footmarks in the snow. I followed, desperately hoping they led in the right direction.
Thankfully I didn’t have time to worry – for I had another two mountains to climb that day.
As an ordinary 49-year-old journalist I was more used to days spent sitting at a keyboard, on the telephone or in a traffic jam. Suddenly I’d found myself in an acute mountaineering adventure.
And this was just at the start of the extreme travel experience I’d been seeking for my 50th birthday – although by now I was wondering whether I’d bitten off more than I could chew. Would I even survive the adventure?
It had started as a crazy plan hatched in a cosy pub months before - an exciting pre-birthday trip to overcome feelings of impending senility.
On a whim - and several pints - I’d decided tackle the highest mountains in England (Scafell Pike), Scotland (Ben Nevis) and Wales (Snowdon). I’d never been up a mountain but thought they must be quite easy. And to make it more exciting, I decided to try to do them all in 24 hours.
Only later did I find out that would involve me having to cover 24 miles on foot, 500 miles in the car, and climb a total of 3,406 meters… all within one day.
One mountain would have to be climbed in the dark and all three would have to be walked, jogged and scrambled at roughly twice the speed quoted in guide books. To put that amount of climbing in context, ascending Everest from base camp to the summit is 3,000m.
As someone who normally spends most of his day sitting down, the three peaks challenge would be the hardest thing I’d ever done. In fitness and experience, I was starting from a very low base camp indeed.
First I found a more experienced climbing partner, Pip Davey, and a reliable mountain support driver, Simon Fenton. Both are RAF officers: younger, fitter, used to planning expeditions, working through the night and perhaps most importantly, finding their way in the dark.
Then I realised I had to get seriously fit or there was a risk that, not only would I not reach the trio of summits, I wouldn’t reach my 50th birthday either.
Even fit young people are killed and more than 50 climbers rescued on each of these mountains every year. “It used to be mainly students we pulled off,” one mountain rescue expert told me before I set off, “now it’s mostly middle-aged blokes like you.”
That’s because more and more blokes like me are having a go at our biggest peaks. The Three Peak Challenge has become a popular event in recent years. I met one very fit photographer who did the three peaks on his stag night. Hundreds more climbers will attempt the challenge this year, many in large sponsored groups.
Indeed, given good weather, most people could climb any one of the peaks. Each has paths to the top. In some places they are smooth gravel tracks, in others there is just bare rock with occasional cairns to guide you.
I was encouraged to hear that the record for running up and down Ben Nevis is less than 90 minutes (by superhuman fell-runner Ken Stuart from Keswick). One local fireman has run up and down five times in one day and is attempting to do it six times in 24 hours this year.
Well, I hope he has better weather than us. I arrived in Fort William to find it was windy, cold and raining. The summit of Ben Nevis, looming moodily above the Highland town, was shrouded in ominous dark cloud like a scene from Lord of the Rings.
Experts in Fort William’s mountaineering shops raised their eyebrows when we said we were going up that day. “Have you seen the latest weather reports?” they asked. We had, they’re posted everywhere around the town. But we weren’t going to let a little thing like weather halt six months of planning.
So Pip and I started dashing up the rocky trail in high spirits, inspired by spectacular views across Glen Nevis and the surrounding peaks and lochs. It was 5pm and we needed to be back down by 9pm, before darkness.
There was no sight, however, of the piano carried up by a team of builders 50 years ago and recently discovered under a cairn. And there was certainly no sign of how a Model T Ford made it to the top in five days in 1911 as a promotional stunt.
After an hour’s fast marching, we met other climbers coming down, looking exhausted and weather-beaten. One was being helped by his colleagues. Another gasped: “It’s terrible up there!”
Sure enough, gradually conditions worsened. We were heading towards black rocky heights hidden in swirling clouds. We spotted more and more patches of snow. Once we entered the clouds our rocky route became covered in ice. Progress slowed to a slippery stagger.
At the top of a momentous zigzag up the final west face we hit the full blizzard. We’d previously agreed this was where we’d consider turning back if conditions were bad.
The Ben Nevis’ summit is notoriously dangerous in poor visibility. The route to the peak passes close to the edge of the north face, a black cliff dropping hundreds of feet. On the other side is another drop, into a deep gulley.
Bravely, and perhaps foolishly, we thought it was worth the risk. The summit seemed so close now. And as the sleet blasted into my eyes and the wind knocked me to my knees, I had to tell myself there’s something good about it being so horrible, so scary. When was all over I would feel I’d really conquered something very, very hard. That’s if I survived.
We stumbled into the summit. Visibility was so poor we often lost sight of each other even though we were trying to walk side-by-side. We crouched against the storm, following footsteps in the snow.
I could just make out Britain’s highest war memorial and the final cairn. I scrambled up, took a quick photo, then we set off down again. After all, we still had two more mountains to go.
Ben Nevis, at 1,344m (4,408ft) is the highest of the three national peaks. Snowdon is second highest at 1,085m (3,560ft) but the shortest paths leave from a car park on Llanberis Pass, already a third of the way up.
England’s Scafell Pike, nominally the lowest of the trio at 978m (3,210ft), starts almost at sea level and has the most difficult path. It involves more rock clambering than the others and has the bleakest, most hostile summit. And that’s where we headed next…
There wasn’t much sleep during a cramped six-hour overnight drive to Wasdale Head, Cumbria. I was wedged among dirty boots, wet socks and discarded banana skins.
Scafell is the least known of these national mountains – it stands above Wast Water, England’s deepest lake, in Britain’s wettest valley, in the remote west of the Lake District.
Its storm-blasted crags, austere cliffs and steep scree sides make it a far cry from the gentle scenery of the lakes I knew around Windermere and Coniston. In the darkness of three in the morning, Scafell is a daunting prospect.
Despite our head torches, waterproof maps and compasses, Pip and I soon got lost. To make it worse, there was rain and mist. We clambered up wet rock faces and crossed torrential waterfalls – but didn’t know where we were.
We’d hoped to time it right for a glorious sunrise – but all we got was a heavier rainstorm as we scrambled upwards. Somehow we found the cloud-covered summit as dawn broke. Wind howled around the substantial stone cairn on top of England, so we turned wordlessly round and began a slippery descent to the warm, dry car a long way below.
The five-hour drive to Snowdon gave us time to massage aching knees, pray for better weather and eat more energy bars.
We knew Snowdon was Britain’s most popular peak. More than 350,000 attempt it each year – although that figure is boosted by 120,000 who use the mountain railway to get there. Nevertheless, it’s a serious mountain: on average six people die and 70 are injured annually.
We arrived at 11am and already day-trippers thronged the paths across the spectacular horseshoe of peaks. It was strange to see awkward rocky paths as crowded as Christmas shopping streets. Sadly there was soon Christmas weather to match – a cold, biting wind, drizzle and yet more mist.
Forget the famous panorama of 24 counties, 29 lakes and 17 islands, yet again we were denied a view from the summit. On exceptionally clear days from Snowdon you can see Merrick in southern Scotland, 144 miles away. That’s the longest line of sight in the UK.
We however struggled to even see the blockhouse summit café once described as ”the highest slum in Wales” by Prince Charles. It is due to be demolished and stylishly rebuilt later this year.
Again, we hurried back down, eating and drinking our final supplies as we tumbled down the steep Miner’s Path. Eventually, with tired feet and bleary heads, we collapsed into the car at 2pm.
We’d conquered the three peaks in little over 21 hours. I didn’t feel triumphant. I didn’t feel anything except deep weariness and relief. I could stop walking now.
We headed straight for St Curig’s Church B&B nearby to recover. It was only when I was lying in their garden hot tub gazing up at Snowdon that I my brain started to function normally again and I began to feel a sense of achievement.
I’d survived! I’d finished it! I’ll never forget that day – the hardest physical thing I’ve done in my life. And now I’m so proud I finished it and that I raised a substantial sum for charity too.
But as for a birthday celebration next year, my wife thinks I should stick to a nice quiet dinner party instead…