Day 39 – Silhouetted Stags and Curious Bulls

Thursday, 8th September 2011

Tom and Alex were up and out by 0500 after a luxury bacon roll breakfast, and were off into the pouring rain again! But they were ready for the day ahead thanks to a night spent in a lovely bothy courtesy of Edinburgh University. The inside of the bothy was wonderfully decorated, and the team spent last night playing twister on the spots that were painted on the floor and then toasting marshmallows on the open fire.

Tom, Alex and Becky had a good day of climbing which started with a wonderful viewing of a stag silhouetted on the top of a hill in the morning sun. They were confronted with every type of weather too; rain, wind, sun and showers as they completed another five munros which were all dedicated to the Mercian Regiment: Beinn Flhionhlaidh, Carn Eighe, Mam Sodhail, Tom a’ Choinich and Toll Creagach. Benn Fhionhlaidh was climbed in honour of LCpl Paul Anthony Sandford and Drummer Thomas Wright and was sponsored by Bob Spencer of Risk Management UK who left the message: “Risk management UK is proud to sponsor DecAid in support of the Mercian Regiment. The sacrifices made by our Armed Forces must always be remembered. Bob Spencer MD”. Toll Creagach was dedicated to Private Brian Tunnicliffe and Carn Eighe was dedicated to Capt Sean Dolan.

The support team managed to have a few extra hours sleep when the team left until it was light enough to pack up the 4x4 with all the kit. They were then back in action: gathering everything together into the vehicle and organising for the next nights camp, stuffing wet boots with newspaper, making the next nights supper and sorting out the dirty washing.

The support team then headed down the off road track in the car next to the still very swollen river they passed yesterday and headed back to pick up the van and the trailor from a small car park at the bottom.

The 4x4 then headed off to do a recce of tonight's camping spot which is up near the damn on Loch Mullardoch. Meanwhile Lucy and Sarah took themselves off to do a shop at Aldi in Inverness and then headed up to Loch Mullardoch to meet the 4x4. There were a herd of very interested cows all around the track below the damn and a very suspicious bull that was particularly interested in the car!

Lucy and sarah meanwhile managed to speak to the very nice estate stalker who offered us his shed to camp in and the use of a very plush kitchen in the holiday cottage next door. It is normally used as a chiller for the deer meat but the stalker very kindly turned off the chiller for us so that we weren't quite camping in a fridge!

Ceri and Lewis headed up to the road bike drop off ready for the team so that they could cycle down to the shed and Henry and Tom headed up the last munro to meet Tom, Alex and Becky.

They all arrived back at around 2230 for a quick chicken curry supper and into bed by midnight.

End of day 39 – 225 munros climbed