Scafell Pike

The idea was for the three of us to take turns driving between the mountains. However, due to being an inexperienced driver and feeling terrible I slept all the way to Scafell Pike, apart from the last hour when having to travel over Hardknott and Wrynose pass made me feel sick. I was feeling seriously ill at this point. I felt sweaty and had flu like symptoms. I was reciting what I would say to the others in my head when I was to tell them I was going to quit. When the car pulled up the need to do this had lessened and after a quick visit to the bushes I decided to continue, my feelings unknown to the other two. Sitting in the back for the whole journey with no room, no air (three door car), loud music and rucksacks knocking against you every 5 minutes hadn’t done wonders for my general well-being, what with Dave in rally mode with all the headlights on full beam driving over the passes.

Not a soul

Scafell Pike was to be the only mountain we would have to climb in the dark, due to our rearranged departure time from the base of Ben Nevis. We donned our Petzl head torches, quickly got ready and at 02:45hrs we walked upstream from the car park, with head torches lighting up oval patches of light yards from our feet as we progressed upwards. The provision of a powerful car torch by myself helped in long distance navigation, as to which path we should take (It was an invaluable aid as there is not an obvious route up Scafell Pike at night). Dave’s idea of word games helped pass the time, as did singing songs and having general thoughts in your head.

Group word games didn’t last long though and would have to have been ended anyway as the gaps between Dave, Nick and I constantly grew. We soon hit the snow. This in itself lit up the surrounding area with the cold snow reflecting any available light there was from the cloudy sky and our torches. We could see where we needed to go, but were unaware of the concavity of the slope we were climbing. Consequently half way up we realised crampons were needed, and with only a chair sized rock in the distance to our right, allowing room for only one person, we each took turns to clamber up and put on our crampons. Fifteen minutes were wasted here as we each took our turn. It gave us a nice break but each 5 minutes of wasted time does quite quickly add up. At this time we felt our most vulnerable. Perching on a rock half way up a snow covered gully with only head torches for light, no sound, no wind and no other company at 04:30hrs in April was an amazing feeling.

Photo of Dave. 12k JPG 12K JPG

Dave halfway up the gully.

Let's get back down again

There were no footprints to follow this time for footholds. Nobody had been up here in days. Being the slowest member did have its advantages here, as Nick and Dave’s virgin footprints gave me places to push off (a home made flight of stairs). Once again ice axes were used and no foot movements were made until these had been firmly hit into the ground, and then with a kicking action the feet were powered into the snow. The top of the gully was soon reached and we progressed onwards. False summit after false summit greeted us, until the real summit was reached, before which our crampons had to cross many rock outcrops (easier than you might think). I was very relieved to touch the trig point (the time was now 05.10hrs). This time we quickly made a cup of tea, took some pictures and descended, (not much of a view on this occasion, which is probably just as well, as you can apparently see the Sellafield nuclear power station in the distance during daylight hours). This wasn’t the place to hang around in. We soon reached the top of the snow covered gully and dropped down backwards kicking both our feet and ice axe into the snow, as the footholds we had used on the way up were now out of our sight as we moved backwards. At this point Dave noticed that one of his crampons was missing. We weren’t going to go back for it so we continued (they were a cheap pair anyway).

As the concave gully flattened out, Dave used the technique of double foot jumping sideways, whilst I was quite happy to slide down the hill at a constant speed of 3 mph needing no use of the ice axe. Nick however was now out of sight adopting the much slower backwards method, (this was the first time we had not been in contact with another member of the trio). A shout up to him resulted in no reply. Five seconds later he appeared around the corner 40 yards away, all was well. We all took our crampons off before the ice had ended and jogged and walked back down to Wasdale Head. You realise how good crampons are when you first take them off! There were a few slips over the last 100 yards of snow, even though it was relatively flat by now. Nick went ahead and got to the car first. Being high up the dawn broke instantly and the head torches were turned off. A quick change of clothes and we all climbed into the car, and headed off to Snowdon. (06.30hrs).

Back to the main page.