Not a great idea to be honest 🙂

Topped out on the south summit of The Cobbler (in zero visibility) at 10.30pm last night, slept (yeah right) on the tiny summit with mrs peterfile in pretty grim weather and then down climbed at 4.30am this morning in even worse weather. Came straight to the office, had a shower, and now everyone thinks I’m hungover.

Feel pretty ropey.

Please cheer me up with tales of midweek adventures. Is there a technique to doing this without feeling like you’ve been hit by a bus?

Was the plan to spend the night there?

Yeah, intentional benightenment. Wasn’t expecting the weather/visibility to be so poor though 🙁

I keep forgetting how much ascent is involved with Arrochar Alps, since they all start from sea level. Perhaps a poor choice of mountain for this sort of thing.

Island on Derwent water via Kayak once, BBQ, beers and a bad nights sleep followed by a paddle back.

In a couple of hours you’ll be looking for the quite room in the office…

you should have left it a day or 2 😀 our Glasgow heatwave is on the way !

I think i hit that stage within 30 seconds of putting my suit on mike! 🙂

you should have left it a day or 2 our Glasgow heatwave is on the way !

I know 🙁 Monday evening was my only opportunity though. Saw an awesome sunrise as I cleared the cloud at about 550m though.

The idea of sleeping outdoors is so much better than the reality IMO.

Please tell me you didn’t make the beginners error of not taking a couple of hipflasks of decent whiskey with you, did you?

fundamental schoolboy stuff, my friend!

A couple of bottles of Old Peculiar, Binners. I’m not THAT daft 😉

Spot on binners. Last time on the Cobbler for me with girlfriend (now wife) in the 1980s we were fortified by a whole bottle of Glenmorangie. Ah, memories!!

Do it on a Friday instead.

Is there a technique to doing this without feeling like you’ve been hit by a bus?

Have good kit so you do get a good night’s sleep?

Have good kit so you do get a good night’s sleep?

No issues with kit, think I couldn’t sleep because of the time pressure looming in my mind, plus knowing that I had a full day of work to get through.

Most of it felt psychological rather than physical.

Are you not scared that monsters might get you ? Werewolves, wild big cats, yetis, sharks with frickin lasers ?

I spent the night on the couch last night cos there was a huge spider above the bed.

there were a few sheep that were making a really odd vomiting noise, which was a wee bit spooky, especially considering how foggy it was. But I had chilli for dinner so I think my bottom noises kept them at a safe distance.

That would be the spazzed out exploding Olympic sheep I guess….

Were-sheep?

>Not a great idea to be honest<

I think you just answered your own question.

Don’t know how many of you are familiar with the summit of the Cobbler but I’d be feeling pretty ropey if I’d spent the night on a few m2 of sloping rock with sheer drops on 4 sides.

There’s a proper doss further down the hill. Try that next time and you might hook up with some old timers who’ll provide you with a better nights entertainment 😉

I know the summits well enough to know where not to wander (even in cack visibility or winter).

The sleeping wasn’t too bad (found a small bit of flat just to the north of the south summit, but still worringly exposed over the east facing cliffs), trying to work our way off the south summit in wet/dark/foggy conditions this morning wasn’t very nice, but still preferable to coming down the north or centre paths with heavy packs on. Biggest issue is wet mica schist – my worst nightmare.

I have spotted a couple of wee bivvy caves under the climbs on the south summit on previous trips, but just couldn’t seem to find them last night.

EDIT: wow, just checked photos and it looks like we pitched right next too the central summit. Hadn’t realised how far we must have walked off the south summit (hmmm, please disregard my comment about knowing the summits well!)

“The Longest Commute” – see past Singletrack, issue 30 or so? – involved setting off from Glentress, biking most of the way to Edinburgh, then a bivvy stop for about 6/7 of us. Then complete the ride and into work. Did feel distinctly odd as the day progressed, colleagues just thought me nuts.

Due to the alcohol involved, we *were* hungover 🙂

Island on Derwent water via Kayak once, BBQ, beers and a bad nights sleep followed by a paddle back.

that sounds fricking oarsome, pity I don’t work on the banks of derwent. think the equivalent for me would be gorton res or if there’s some island in the middle of salford quays

not overnight, but up at 3am on the longest day for a 6 hour ride to work. Expected to feel like you do now, but was really good all day. Even extended the ride home to 2 hours.
The next day was a different story…

I take it the bivvi bags held up OK then?

I take it the bivvi bags held up OK then?

It was hoofing it down when we parked up, so I strapped the tent to my pack too (which was the source of much frustration as I tried to yank a heavy pack up 900m). Glad I did though, since mrs peterfile was not really feeling the love for bivvying by the time we hit the summit (to be fair, it was cold, wet, dark, exposed, and we were knackered) so the tent was a welcome shelter on a rather exposed mountain. I think the weather would need to be quite fine to bivvy on the Cobbler, since there aren’t too many sheltered spots up top.

Cheers though Al, I really do appreciate the effort. I’ll get them back in the post to you asap.

Your mistake was probably not setting off early enough for your climb up. For me topping out at 10:30 then having to wake at 4:30 would have been a non starter. Getting to the top for 9ish might have worked better.

Maybe also sleep in one of the wee caves/howfs in bad weather on the cobbler.

Have camped on the summit of Helvellyn (in a real tent) and it was great fun, but then I didn’t have to get up early to get to work.

For me topping out at 10:30 then having to wake at 4:30 would have been a non starter.

Oh absolutely. It wasn’t intentional. We had a couple of difficulties on the last 300m, which resulted in us making really slow progress and taking a fairly length break for some food and rest.

Because the visibility and wet rock had been so poor on the way up, I was planning for the worst on the return (added on an additional hour to how long it normally takes us, on the basis of big packs and slippy underfoot) Although, once we were clear of the south crags we made surprisingly good progress down to the forest. Plus, rather than bivvying we ended up pitching the tent, which added on another 30 mins of faffing about this morning.

Lesson learned is that it’s probably just too big a hill for us to do after work. It’s 900m of ascent thanks to the sea level start, with some fairly hard going stuff along the way. Ben Donich would have been better since you can start from 500m at Rest and Be Thankful.

I dunno about it being too big to do after work. I’ve had a 3hr round trip on the Cobbler before from Arrochar. Conditions do make a huge difference though. You could try going straight on at the narnain boulders towards ben ime then take a left and climb up the back of the cobbler as a quicker less technical route.

I’ve been down that north path glupton, normally as a quick route down in winter, but never up it.

We ended up taking the middle path straight up torwards the north summits (not a massive fan of it in the wet, but I know it the best, so seemed like a good option given the visibility), then south across the ridge, scrambling down the side of the south summit (hunting for bivvy caves), back up the south summit taking an alternative (and sketchy) route and then ended up sleeping just next to the central summit. The visibility was just so bad. I hate it when it’s like that up there (which it seems to be so often).

Our packs were the biggest problem. It’s just such slow and clunky progress on that rock with heavy packs (give me some gabbro anyday!!!)

In hindsight, I wish we’d dug deep and headed up Narnain instead.

500m at Rest and Be Thankful.

If you’re really lucky there will be a new landslip waiting for you in the morning to add a nice little diversion for the drive to work.. 😉

hahaha i know! Ben Donich was our original choice, until last week’s slip. I wasn’t too keen on that part of the A83 after the amount of rain there has been since the road reopened on Saturday (there’s still a “use extreme caution” advisory).

The thought of a 50m diversion after coming off a “quick” hill wasn’t too appealing.

Take less with you, start off earlier, have some nice treats on the top. Don’t beat yourself up, you’ve had an adventure, gone out and done it.

I don’t care how tired you are, try having kids.
oh, and your mountaineering trips are useless without pics.

Take less with you, start off earlier, have some nice treats on the top. Don’t beat yourself up, you’ve had an adventure, gone out and done it.

Generally, I would agree. But the whole point of this was to see if I could do it leaving after work and being back in time for work 🙂 Normally any summit wild camps are followed by a day of baths and wine!

Less stuff definitely – but i’ve got a tendency to carry winter stuff all year.

I don’t care how tired you are, try having kids.
oh, and your mountaineering trips are useless without pics.

To follow, slightly differently this time though. That said, there was to much Top of The Pops dry ice everywhere that it was hard to take a photo at all (the autofocus on the DSLR just stopped working).

We camped at Llyn Idwal one weekend night. Camped in the dark but nice enough conditions, no wind. Just as we were ready to sleep at about midnight it started to get blowy, and was about a force 8 by first light. No sleep whatsoever, had to walk home utterly knackered.

The only work related one I have is flying back from the USA landing Monday morning. Crap flight, short tube ride to work got there at 7am. Place was deserted, I was absolutely hangin.

Oh just remembered. I used to live in Didsbury, and one summer me and a housemate would regularly get the train to Hathersage, taxi up to Stanage for some beautiful evening climbing. Walk back down to the village, couple of pints in the pub then leg it for the last train. Great stuff 🙂

Brilliant effort 🙂
The best of nights, the worst of nights – as Turnbull put it so well.