3 Peaks Challenge 2005
Three Peaks Challenge, 30 April - 1 May 2005
Congratulations to the 31 walkers who completed the mighty Three Peaks Challenge in break-neck speed for PhotoVoice. Widely regarded as one of the toughest challenges in the UK, the Three Peaks Challenge involves climbing the highest peaks in Scotland (Ben Nevis - 1344m,) England (Scafell - 978m) and Wales (Snowdon - 1085m) within 24 hours, including the driving (10 hours).
The peaks pose no small challenge for anyone wishing to climb them in succession but we are delighted to report that all 31 intrepid trekkers strode past the finish line in good humour, excelling themselves in every way imaginable. Our special congratulations go to Gumby (Matt Boyd) who has laid down the gauntlet for future challengers, completing the event in just 22 hours and 40 minutes.
Our thanks go to everyone who took part and showed great resilience in the face of sleep-deprivation, injury and foul weather. More importantly a huge thank you for raising in excess of £20,000 for PhotoVoice - a remarkable and truly unexpected achievement.
One final thank you to Barny for creating an incredible and hilarious film of the weekend. To buy a copy, please email jo@photovoice.org.
Read on for photos and stories from the challenge...
3 peaks, 24 hours. (by Charlie Devereux)
The 4.06 from King's Cross St. Pancras arrives Luton Airport 4.57. 3 bags, one walking stick leave on the 6.20pm flight from Luton. 3 bags arrive Edinburgh airport, no stick.
Stick on its own Five Peak Challenge : London-Edinburgh-Belfast-London-Edinburgh, arrives Saturday 9.30am.
One night in Edinburgh : beer, wine and single malt whisky.
One high-carb breakfast : 12 rashers of bacon, 12 sausages. Eggs,12, mushrooms and toast - divide by 5 hungry soon-to-be walkers.
11am, Edinburgh airport. 31 boys and girls meet. 3 minibuses, 5 drivers and navigators. 4 hours drive to Fort William, arrive 3pm.
One helicopter sighted circling Ben Nevis. Reports of one man found on the mountain, body partly devoured by his 2 dogs...
One bagpiper to set us on our way. 3 teams, 3 guides depart at 4pm. 1345 metres of mountain to climb.
Steady rise up rocky incline followed by a flat stretch past a murky-black lake under granite cliffs.
At 1000 meters still no vista of the summit but first sight of snow. 34 walkers and guides criss crossing the landscape as the gradient increases.
34 water bottles filled from an ice fresh stream above the sheep-line.
The final 100 metres, a 2 foot blanket of snow, trudging past sheer cliffs plunging hundreds of metres down the north face of the mountain.
And at the summit a rare sight - a view from the top of Ben Nevis : broad brushstrokes of clouds sweeping across the sky and a golden highlight of the loch in the distance. Beyond that, views to Skye and Rhum.
A swift descent down the mountain, boots sliding down the snowy upper echelons, the sky constantly transforming itself until it settles on a terracotta orange.
Climb completed in 5 and a half hours, ahead of schedule.
31 hungry walkers descend on Fort William. 31 fish suppers and 62 pints of McEwans ale.
Fort William-Glencoe-Stirling-Gretna Green-Carlisle-Keswick-Seathwaite. 36 walkers and drivers share 40 schoolbus seats = average sleep per walker, 2 hours. Arrive Seathwaite 6am.
7am depart to climb Scafell Pike, following the line of a crystal clear stream. Rocky pools of turquoise glimpsed through the mist, the surrounding fields a day-glo green. A steady ascent for the first two hours, leaving the stream behind and picking our way over or round man-size boulders. Two false peaks before we reach the top.
No view to speak of, a pile of rocks enveloped in a blanket of drizzle and fog. On reaching the top, greeted by a barrage of thunder and lightning.
3 minutes to record our presence at England's highest peak (975 metres) in digital images and restock energy with home-made flapjacks.
A blind descent through thunder, lightning, hail and rain over mossy stones. We rejoin the stream, previously a friendly, chattering glassy brook, now an angry torrent of muddy red water, like white noise on a tv. Tributaries we had barely noticed now have to be leapfrogged.
Path has morphed with stream, in places 6 inches deep in water.
31 hikers, 2 crocked knees, 5 and a half hours. 3 dead, rainsoaked mobile phones, 2 broken cameras, 1 caput iPod.
62 soaked socks, 31 ineffective sets of waterproofs, 3 stinking vans.
Swift breakfast of bacon butties and tea.Seathwaite-Keswick-Chester-Snowdonia-Pen-y-pan at 5pm.
5 minutes studying map in visitor centre and a pledge to climb and descend Snowdon as fast as possible and return to hotel for baths and drinks.
A sharp climb to a ridge overlooking a string of glassy blue/green lakes overshadowed by towering cliffs. Then a series of sharp zig zags up to the backbone of Snowdon along which runs the railway. A brief stop at the summit to record the feat. Even briefer descent. 31 walkers stretched across the mountain like elastic band, ready to catapult back to the hotel.
Andrew Bredon, Anna Blackman, Annie Dare, Amy Crocker, AnuGopal, Arfan Rafique, Barny Crocker, Charlie Devereux, Chris Pawson, Edwina Vine, Ella Saltmarshe, Giles Griffiths, Jackie King, James Hallett, Joe Cooke, JT Wong, Katherine Monk, Leigh Walker, Matt Boyd, PaulIsrael, RachelTanner, Ronnie Graham, Ruairidh Mackenzie, Ryan Masters, Saeed Farouky, Serena Docker, Stephen Stapleton, Tiffany Fairey Tris Fitzgerald, Victoria Walford, Will Fisher, 26 miles walked, 800 miles driven, 3 peaks, 24 hours, more than £20,000 raised.
Worth it? You do the maths.
'Well, I made it (just). It went a little something like this... (by Andrew Bredon)
1. Ben Nevis (Scotland), started the climb to Ben Nevis to the tune of bagpipes, supplied by one of the fellow PhotoVoicers who happened to be a Scot. Was pretty difficult going at the start, I lost pace with the group that I started with and within 45 mins I feared I was never going to make all three mountains, but as we climbed more, with the aid of Frenchie our brilliant guide, I got more into a rhythm and managed to get to the snow covered summit. We stuck around for about as long enough to consume a handful of nuts and a pork pie and decided to go down, it was extremely cold at the top and any time you stopped moving you got very cold, very quickly. It was really great to make it to the summit, we did it as a group and stuck together and the views on the way up were spectacular. However (probably very selfishly) for some reason I decided on the way down from Ben Nevis that it would be easier to run and that's what I did for most of the descent. I am not sure why it seemed easier or where the fitness came from, but I was the first person down and the fastest person up and down in 4hrs 49 mins, sadly I left my group behind, which I felt bad about, but once my large frame started moving downhill, it was pretty hard to stop it. I think at this point it should be pointed out that I was dosed up to the nines on 400g ibuprofen and having regular 2hr doses of codeine to help my aching foot (an injury I had picked up the Sunday before playing squash), now I am not saying that I cheated, there were quite a few of people who took drugs, but there were a lot of people who didn't. I am pretty sure I wouldn't have made it without the aid of my little white friends...
Start time: 5:00pm Saturday afternoon
Target time: 6hrs
Time achieved: 4hrs 49 mins
Total Time: 4hrs 49 mins
2. Scafell Pike (England)- 5/6 hrs in a mini-van with lovely, but smelly people, unable to find a position to sleep, legs constantly cramping because there is no leg room to stretch out does not provide for great preparation for taking on the next mountain. I am pretty sure I had about 3hrs sleep max and at one point I had to sleep standing up because the cramp got so bad. Thanks to Anna and Giles for shifting so I could get some legroom to stretch out. We arrive at Scafell Pike and the weather doesn't look good - dark clouds surround the peak and we all start mentally preparing for a cold, wet and hard climb to the summit. Nothing could have prepared us for the misery that was ahead. 45 mins into the climb our guide, turns to me, as I was flagging at the back and said, "I really want to get you up this mountain, but I don't think you are going to make it", he did this to me twice, all I could think was "I just needed to plod through the first bit god dammit and I will be fine", instead I just looked at him and said "I'll be ok" and I was, halfway into the climb I got my second wind.
This mountain was by far the hardest, mostly because of the two large patches of rock just before the final summit climb, very slippery and very tiring and because there was very little visibility, probably 5-6 metres was as far you could see sometimes. We hit the summit, another handful of nuts, some photos and a banana and we are away back down. 4 or 5 minutes into the descent, thunder and lightening cracks around us and it starts to absolutely bucket down. Our guide instructs us to pick up our pace, which we do, racing across the aforementioned treacherous rocks, but now with pelting rain our backs and in our faces. I didn't think it could get much more miserable this, until of course I got 1/4 way down and realised that I had another 3/4 to go, soaked through to the skin and my waterproof boots filled with water. When the path became track more than rock, we started running and we ran pretty much until the halfway point, at which we all gathered for a break as the rain stopped...
We then set off again at pace, running most of the way, I stopped running at points because my foot was so sore I could barely take another step (solution? more codeine), the group was pretty splintered at this point, 3 or 4 running ahead and rest of the group behind, all I could think about was my foot and getting out of these soaking clothes. The codeine kicks in and it all seems bearable again, that was of course until the hail started and when the hail finished, the pelting rain began (enough rain to cause flash floods) which followed us all the way to bottom. I can't think of time when I have been more miserable. The idea of coming down this mountain, cold and soaking to a freezing stinky minibus, I really started to question what I was doing! I think I was 6th or 7th up and down, but just so relieved to have made it back down. To add insult to injury, I had my phone, my ipod and my camera in my bag, which got soaked through and has rendered aforemetioned pieces of technology busted. The final straw was the van door had been left open and my only pair of dry shoes were soaked through, it was my fault for leaving them where they were, but I kind of lost it anyway and apologies for anyone who was nearby for that rant.
Start time:6:00am Sunday morning.
Target time: 5hrs
Time achieved: 4hrs 51 mins
Total Time: 9hrs 40 mins
3. Snowdon (Wales) - More minivan pain, more sleep deprivation. It's hard to decide what was harder, the climbing or enduring the pain of the minivan. Saying that, we had a great group of people, who pretty much got on well together despite the endless possibilities to lose your humour in mist of the mountain or the steam of the minivan and two great drivers in Jilly and Becky.
We arrive at Snowdon, all of my walking clothes are soaked, my boots are soaked and the prospect of climbing one final mountain seems impossible to fathom. Luckily conditions are better than Scafell, it's cold, but not wet and thank god those conditions hold all the way to the summit and back down again. This mountain is a free for all, we don't stay in groups and I pretty much plod this one all the way by myself. Again every step on my right ankle is agony, unfortunately not even the codeine seems to be helping me now. The summit takes a hell of a long time to reach, made worse by the swarms of people who have made it to the top and who are coming down saying only 5 minutes to go, when in reality its 35 minutes.
Snowdon as a mountain is by far the easiest, tarmac paths in places and only a difficult patch of zig-zags toward the top. The views were almost none, because of serious cloud cover, but the lakes lying below Snowdon were a beautiful sight. Big thanks to Anu and Annie for helping me get down, not sure I would have been able to do it otherwise. I am not sure where I finished on this mountain, very far towards the back, was just very pleased to finish it.
Start time: 6:00pm Sunday night.
Target time: 3hrs
Time achieved: 3hrs 3 mins
Total Time: 12hrs 43 mins
Amazingly I finished the whole thing in 22hrs 43mins (12hrs 43 mins + 10hrs travelling time), which out a group of 31 people was second fastest by 3 mins (fastest time = 22hrs 40 mins). Overall the experience was incredible, I have never felt more physically or mentally knackered and I would definitely never ever do it again. That's it, check, 3 highest mountains in Britain, next challenge 24hrs on the sofa... '
To post your account / photos of the Three Peaks Challenge on our website, please email jo@photovoice.org