Rob-n-Hild Take the High Road!

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Ben Lomond. Distance 12.17 km in 7:46 hours although with moving time only being 2:55 hours giving an average speed of 1.56 km/h! Truth is that we only sat down for two different meal/tea breaks but these did not take 5 hours! In other words, we walked so slowly that our gadgets did not record any movement. Now that is embarrassing! Our excuse is that we ascended 1,120 metres to a maximum of 974 metres on top of Ben Lomond. The colours on the map below illustrates the higher (red) vs lower (blue) altitudes.

We got up early, had porridge for breakfast and drove to the car park at the Ben Lomond trail head. Research told us to be early because the car park would fill up quickly. In the end Wednesday in June was not very busy, but we were happy to get started before it got too hot.

We paid for parking until midnight - just to be sure. Rob cleverly parked Percy near the exit so we could quickly escape any parking mayhem on our return. A very friendly Robin greeted us and clearly expected to be fed (no luck here mate). Rob then got various gadgets going to record our outing in terms of distance, time, altitude, and heart rate.

The trail starts off easy, sloping gently, and we looked fresh and optimistic. Rob was a bit puzzled by the size of the gate we had to walk through. Normally these are to keep sheep in their field, but this looks more like something out of Jurassic Park. Check the brochure, Rob, are there raptors here?

As we started climbing the foothills of Ben Lomond, the views became more and more amazing. We could see many mountains in the distance as well as Loch Lomond below us.

We could see and hear lots of sheep all around.

Turning around to look toward the south we saw more of the loch and also the trail we had just walked - snaking its way up the hill. Hild was still smiling.

The trail turned into a scramble across rocks sometimes with steps requiring 90 degree bend in knees and hips. Phew. There was much huffing and puffing and not as many smiles as at the start.

It was nice to have a clear path to follow. In the 1990s the path was causing much erosion because people wandered here and there. The path was 10-20 metres wide and could be seen all the way from Glasgow! Much better now.

After climbing 750 metres Hild was all out of smiles and requested that this be the location of our first lunch and tea break of the day. She named the cairn and surrounding area "base camp", predicting that she may not be able to continue.

We got ourselves settled and sheltered behind the cairn on our ground sheet and got the kettle boiling. Life is better when there is a cup of tea in our hand.

While we were drying our rather sweaty clothes on the cairn, there was a rare sighting of Darth Vader in the foothills of Ben Lomond!

Hild did not used to like ponchos, but now she is a poncho-convert. The poncho sheltered her from the wind so she could dry her clothes.

Kristin asked if we had claimed the cairn for Norway with the flags prominently in the photo. Sadly, that is not the case. Those are the scarves/hats Adelheid gave us when she visited. We LOVE them! They cut the wind and keep the flies away from your ears.

We kept reminding ourselves to turn around and look back at the trail we had completed. If nothing else to keep our spirit up. But then you can't complain about that view, can you!? Even on a hazy day like today, it is very rewarding after the slog up the hill.

Just before the last push up to the top, we got a combined view of: The view back over Loch Lomond on the one hand..... and Loch Ard and Loch Chon and the vast wilderness area of Trussachs National Park on the other hand.

Then we came to the final steep push up the hill. Oh the muscles and joints were working hard, indeed!

And then finally, we were at the top. We found the trig point and took a few photos, chatted with some fellow climbers, and moved on. No time to linger because we knew we had hard times ahead. Going downhill is not as easy on old knees and when we had young knees...

We decided to stick with the plan to make this a circular walk, so our return trail was going over to another lower peak called Ptarmigan. The initial descent from Ben Lomond was rather hairy - requiring both legs and arms to make it work safely. Sometimes climbing down backwards was the only way. Most of the time we walked facing forwards. The rocky paths were sometimes helpful and sometimes exhausting.

As we made it across to Ptarmian, we enjoyed looking back at the progress we had made - scrambling down the hillside.

Having made it across to Ptarmigan, we found another sheltered bit to have second lunch. With our ground sheet we had a comfortable tea break and lie-down while other more energetic hikers passed us by.

Karate Kid made a surprise visit too...

Rob posed briefly for this photo at the very top of Ptarmigan, although he was probably stretching his legs as the challenging descent was starting to take its toll on our old knees.

None of our photos show how steep the trail was. Luckily they had been designed in zig-zag to save our knees, no doubt!

As we descended into areas with more vegetation, we came across these instruction for using a "Fire Beater". Never seen one before, but now we know that you sneak up behind the fire and hit it repeatedly with a shovel.

The final few kilometres were on a trail going through lots of ferns. Still, we had a great view of Loch Lomond.

FINALLY! We reached the bottom where we found a wonderfully flat road to hike back to the car park. We were two relieved and happy hikers!

Back in Percy, we rehydrated with Gatorade and Coke Zero. Percy had kept it all cool for us - because he has no windows in the back. Yogi was happy to hear about our hike.

When we met fellow hikers today, most people wanted to talk about the beautiful weather and also if this was our/their first Ben Lomond climb. Then everyone wanted to discuss whether one should do this circuit clockwise or anti-clockwise. We did it anti-clockwise and have come to the conclusion that we would do that again if we had to. Our route was less steep going up and more steep going down. Even with our old knees complaining, this worked best for us because the steep return did not have very many deep steps. The ascent on the other hand had so many very deep steps that we predict would really make our poor knees scream in agony. Still, it was a wonderful day and we're happy to have done it.

Back at the tent it was time to treat ourselves to a hearty dinner. Today's treat for tired hikers: Haggis with baked beans and kavring (Swedish crisp bread), milk, and of course a cup of tea.

Coming up: Stirling

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