Our Night Out

We were 17 and thought ourselves invicible.  Members of the Edinburgh schools ‘Tuesday Group,’ a club for senior pupils keen on mountaineering, we had already been exposed to some wild and exciting days out in the Scottish hills in our young lives.  On this occasion, three of us, Sheila, Oliver and I, decided to tour the Cairngorms and climb Ben Macdui during our December school holidays, and when day-light was at its shortest.  I don’t remember why!

To improve our chances of reaching the summit, we bivvied the night before at the Shelter Stone: a well-known refuge at the base of the Shelter Stone crag, formed by a rock-fall.  The word ‘shelter’ makes it sound grander than a boulder above your head actually is.

I don’t remember getting there, though I recollect poor weather as we crossed the plateau and dropped down to Loch A’an.  We must have trusted that between the three of us, we would somehow navigate the Cairngorm plateau in bad weather, something I would now shy from, even after years of mountaineering in Scotland!

The space under the rock was small, damp, cramped and very cold, but for us, it was an adventure and we were up for it, me with my rubbish ex-army sleeping bag, large orange bivvy-bag, tweed breeches and orange kagoule which ran with condensation.  We got a brew going, slept some and arose early. 

The morning was Cairngorm grey.  We headed upwards on snow and rock in white-out conditions, a steady little group of three, taking it in turns to lead where the snow was deep.  We stopped to check the map regularly, walking on a bearing as we’d been taught.  The contours, the gradient, the shape outlined, seemed to speak to where we were.

We got to the top but…. no cairn.  Strange for Ben Macdui we thought.  We had a bite to eat and the cloud shifted enough to reveal a top higher than the one we were on.  We looked at each other.  Ben Macdui is the highest mountain in the Cairngorms, so where then, were we?  To this day, almost exactly 40 years later, I still have no idea!

I have no memory of leaving that top, or how we found ourselves at the top of a steep slope leading down into the Lairg Ghru as the cloud cleared further and the sunset.  With the snow falling and the background boom of an avalanche, we headed down.  At least we would know for sure where we were and find our way out.

We were now really tired: more so than we had realised.  We reached the valley floor, turned right and plodded towards the Pools of Dee and a refuge beyond, but we were further towards Deeside than we thought.  The snows was deep, and the ground below hard. As the cold of night set in, the stars appeared and we had to decide.  Was it more dangerous to stay here on the path in our damp gear and rest the night, or to keep going and hope to get out?

We opted to stay put and bivvied on the path, the three of us curled together in the snow, exhausted from the day’s efforts.  I remember my mind playing over the bad story, of the teenagers found frozen in the Lairg Ghru in December, and yet I remained captivated by the adventure and the million stars which had now appeared in a dark clear sky.

We were so cold that I’m not sure if any of us slept.  Then one of us spoke.  'Should we move on?'  We did.  One behind the other, head-torches keeping course, we passed the Pools of Dee and on towards the twinkly lights of civilisation.

Sandra

I think it was near the spot marked Ford that we bivied for the night. Note: the Mountain Refuge Hut is long gone, but was where a solider made us a cup of tea the next morning. This is a really old map that has a story attached to it; however, that's for another time.