TGOC2017: Day 8 – Derry Lodge to Braemar

We had done the hard bit, with two-thirds of our Munros climbed, some massive hill days and the huge effort needed to catch ourselves up.  Now, beginning to slow ourselves down was starting to bear fruit. All that was now dashed upon the rocks, like a galleon in a storm, with me arriving in to camp yesterday barely able to walk and forced in to using my walking poles as crutches. This was looking like the time to bring the curtain down on our Challenge effort.

I woke up early, immediately noticing it was bloody cold, with my breath forming a mist in front of my face. Reaching for the down jacket and hat, I lay in my bag and considered the options. I wasn’t yet sure what was wrong with me, and began slowly working through the options I vaguely remembered from Dr John Ellerton’s ‘Casualty Care in Mountain Rescue‘, a 400-page tome on fell medicine.

I ran through the symptoms in my head, pain when I touched the area, no deformity to the limb and swelling present in the lower shin. I was able to walk on it relatively fine, but as soon as it started to bear weight it was significantly painful. There weren’t any ‘crunching’ sounds and no ligaments appeared to hurt – it all pointed to a minor stress fracture, or certainly the beginnings of one – not comforting at all. Looking at the Route Sheet we were expected to finish by Wednesday next week – still 5 days time- something which seemed much, much too far away.  Putting aside whether I would be able to complete the Challenge at all, if I couldn’t improve the pace from my tortoise-like hobble it was liable to take me the best part of 2 weeks to arrive at the east coast anyway.

Fortunately, all of this was tomorrow’s problem, or at least tonight’s – as today we needed to get to Braemar village to the east and rest there for half a day. We began packing up lethargically, noticing the German guys were having a lay-in, and the two other Challengers both began to stir before quickly exploding in to activity, bustling around camp making food and generally seeming in much better spirits than they were yesterday – they both had looked shattered.

I felt I’d be able to get to Braemar – albeit slowly – so I assumed I’d make a judgement once there as to whether it was time to call it a day or not, but for now I wanted as much information as possible to make that decision. Walking over to the Challenge lads to say hi we were fortunate to find they had around 10 crossings between them, opening the door for me to pick their brains for alternative suggestions on ways to change our route.  Ten minutes later we had a host of ‘potential diversions’ scribbled on the Route Sheet before they headed off, mentioning as they went that we should drop in to Mar Lodge for tea and cake, which wasn’t an invitation we intended to turn down.

We began gently moving, painfully slowly at first, being careful to use both poles to take as much weight off the leg as possible. I remember being quite distraught during this first half an hour, Marr was only 7km, but this could easily have taken me all day;  I knew it wasn’t going to work like this and I was on the cusp of retiring.  I could practically feel my determination and optimism draining away.  Gabe was absolutely brilliant, returning the help I had offered him during his struggles with illness during the early part of the Challenge back, with interest. He patiently helped me hobble onwards, kept me motivated, despite likely wondering whether I would ask him to continue solo by the end of the day.

Through all this, the scenery wasn’t half bad even though we were leaving the larger hills behind.  The path to Mar Lodge was enjoyable, if a little dull after our travails of the previous day through the Lairig Ghru, with a different sort of greenery replacing the wind-swept heather and rocky tracks of yesterday. Normally it would have been easy walking, which was lucky as this was about all I could manage – our intended route (involving doubling back for a trio of Corbetts and a look at the Linn of Dee) was quickly shelved for another day without a second thought.

The Germans caught us up and passed around an hour later, only ambling at a slow pace themselves. The path meandered a little, and lo and behold there was a group of guys stood staring intently at the track ahead of us. I realise Scottish whisky is imbibed throughout the day, and with this being a weekend we couldn’t be sure they weren’t half cut, but from a distance it looked very odd indeed.

Arriving closer, this bunch of strange people turned out to be a group of conservationists measuring tadpoles density in puddles. We greeted them pretty cheerfully, unable to muster a single ribbeting joke between us. Things must have been serious. That said, the flat track seemed to have eased my leg a little, as I was now able to speed up to what I would cautiously call a slow walking pace.

Mar Lodge loomed as we emerged from the wood, quite an impressive looking place yet decidedly quiet and seemingly empty. We assumed the guys had been and gone as we were extremely slow getting here. Round a corner, we were met with a line of backpacks of varying sizes, and out of the woodwork Challengers seemed to appear. Mar Lodge was full of the buggers. Dumping the packs, we walked in to say hi to people and it was the strangest feeling – a bit like a school reunion, but of people you’ve only met last week.

There were the two guys from Derry Lodge the previous night, the American couple we met leaving the Rothiemurchus forest, in addition to a couple of guys we had met at Drumnadroicht and one chap from Dornie. That seemed like a lifetime back! We got talking and this is when I truly understood what the Challenge is about, when I finally ‘got it’. It isn’t really about crossing Scotland, that is more the social lubricant, the empty canvas still needing an artist and paint. It is about a bunch of people together, passionate about similar things, all discussing their travels so far – their failures & triumphs, and waxing lyrical about just how much they adore the outdoors. Yes, there were a few in a rough state, but everyone was grinning and joking. I left a note on the white-board, found a packet of biscuits and got stuck in. There was no cake, and whether there ever was any cake seemed a bit of a mystery.

Pretty much all of this motley crew were going to Braemar one way or another, though the vast majority mentioned ditching the Tomintoul viewpoint path (our original route) and instead heading straight towards Braemar. I was taking the road anyway, so figured I’d tag along. Whilst all this was being discussed, Mike Jones walked in, the chap we met in Dornie, our start point. He was in fine spirits yet seemed a wee bit weary, making a beeline for the biscuits almost immediately. That is the sort of thinking which makes you a multiple-time Challenger right there folks.

We drank a load of coffee, finished off plenty of biscuits ourselves and headed off, joining the road for about 5km. I am not sure whether Mar Lodge’s biscuits had magical properties, but somehow I was definitely walking more quickly at this point, despite still having to walk with the ‘crutch’ technique it felt markedly easier than the morning. In our little group we had a Welshman, two Americans, a Pole and several English – all chatting away happily, making time pass quickly.

One of the guys, Merv, was on his 9th crossing, and it turned he is a Yorkshireman like myself – except unlike me, he actually has a proper Yorkshire accent. We got an excellent run down on a lot of the places to go/not to go were we planning any future crossings, not to mention a not-so-brief explanation of street light engineering, his former profession. Now you may think this may have taken away from my Challenge experience, but after a few km on the roads my leg was starting to ache like hell, and Merv really did me a big favour by distracting me from the pain. During the last kilometre I had to drop back, I was struggling to match the dawdling pace of the group.

We arrived in Braemar by mid afternoon, both much the wiser about street lighting and yet somehow simultaneously still not knowing very much at all. Braemar was a first visit for me, and what a lovely little place it is.  Little tea-rooms, a cracking gear-shop and a huge pub, the apparant place of some raucous parties over the years – courtesy of the Challenge.   We found the local co-op and I decided to buy some key medical supplies, ending up walking out with a huge bag of crisps, a four pack of lager and some chocolate. In truth there was precious little to buy in there and we were both glad to have resupplied in Aviemore.

The camp site came next; I had received an email days before telling me there was no issue with space and so didn’t bother booking, but the sheer amount of people descending on the place seemed to surprise everyone, staff included. We ended up getting a plot with a good 15 other people and a tent-forest was soon erected, with everything from Hillebergs to Terra Novas going up whilst the weather was still fine. Now properly set up, some of the lads were starting on the beers early and I felt it would be rude of me to not join in, so I cracked a tin and started having a chat to some of the guys who had arrived earlier, before deciding to head for the showers – which had recently been refurbed. Half an hour later I felt fantastic, with clean(ish) clothes, and I’m sure even the limp had gone a bit.

I gathered from the chat that a lot of people were going to take our original intended route to Lochnagar tomorrow, which was meant to be joined with three other Munros – a route which would mark the last of the hill days on our Challenge. We knew it wasn’t happening, and needed to set off to Braemar Sports to buy a map to work out a way to shelve our intended plans for a whole other route. Munching chocolate and mercifully without my pack, I hobbled my way back to the centre of Braemar, passing Peter the German on the way (we waved), where we sat outside a fish and chip shop with our new map and a chinograph pencil.

Ten minutes later we had a plan. The way we saw it, the most direct route would have been going over the tops before taking Glen Cova towards Montrose, but above all else I needed flat terrain. We agreed on a route we had zero enthusiasm for but knew was necessary, and decided on taking the road to Ballater. If the worst came to the worst we could abandon en-route, there would be plenty of people to give us a lift, but it also let us decide to either head for the coast (just keep walking due east), or try to fit in a little more of our original route in if I started to feel up to it. Pleased with ourselves, and having solved the imminent problem, we hit up Gordons Tearoom for some dinner.

The place was almost full, with us grabbing the last table and ordering a rather hearty meal. I have zero idea what I ordered (I want to say fish and chips), but remember it being tasty, with the staff especially welcoming to a bunch of hikers taking over the joint. Walking back, the leg really started to hurt. Unsure whether the painkillers were wearing off or whether the body was crying out for some rest, I took the hint and retired to my tent as rain started to hit the flysheet.

Still light, I checked the leg, which was pretty swollen. Assuming this was going to be the swansong evening, I thought I’d go out in a bang, quite literally, as I popped open the Doritos bag, opened another beer and decided I’d read my book and relax. I was in actually in strong spirits after the uncertainty of the morning, yet well aware we were nowhere near the east coast yet, with four full days of walking ahead of us at a normal pace, with us currently far from able to do even that.