Days like these are the ones you dream of, for a long time... it takes the stars to align from the weather, climbing partners and if you're trying to film it, low winds good light and a very early start!
Alarms set for 3am... (I got up before my alarm even went off!) nervous, excited and psyched to start our adventure for another amazing day in the Scottish mountains. We had a 2hr drive ahead of us to the base of the route and a steep 2hr walk to gain the crest of the ridge for the sun rise. When we arrived the stars were just incredible, bright and as far as you could see, we even saw a shooting star! This all made the steep walk up easier with views to keep our minds off the usual screaming of the legs. We found a solid track and made fast progress stopping when it became firm to kit up with crampons and axes.
We arrived on the crest of the ridge in good time, with 20mins to spare, we layered up to brave the crisp clear sky which has driven temperatures down. As we paused there, I couldn't believe my eyes, I could see another planet in the distant sky just beside the moon, presumably Mercury as it's the brightest being closest to the sun. This was a first for me and Terry and we grinned from ear to ear for what we knew was going to be a superb day and hopefully get some special footage.
The sun started to rise, illuminating the sky as it rose over the mountains to the south, jaw dropping stuff.. it made the 3 o'clock a distant memory. We had kept the batteries in our inside pockets to protect them from the cold and minimise any delays with getting the drone to fly, especially with a short window of a sunrise! Terry had some ideas and I walked back and forth to get the shots, we reckoned we had some good stuff but never realised just how good it would look until we got home.
With such a great start we took some time to relish the absolute beauty of what we had in front of our eyes, glowing mountains, clear skies, the sun, moon AND Mercury with no wind and the place to ourselves we basked in the glory of the sun and took some pictures. Still grinning, we headed on up towards the first summit of Spidean a' Chorie Leith (Peak of the grey corrie). This provides a fantastic view of the pinnacles and gives a real feel to the ridge and what lies beyond.
We filmed some more shots then headed on down towards the start of the exiting stuff! The Fasarinen Pinnacles. These provided some great moments of exposure, excitement and real good fun with variations to make things slightly harder if need be. We made good progress with filming and enjoyed the sun on our faces as we continued the traverse. We chatted through areas we thought would show the best of the ridge, a few shots and some exciting sections later and before you know it the excitement is over, and the hunger kicked in. We had been enjoying ourselves too much to think about stopping for lunch. Faces stuffed, we headed on up to the last peak of Mullach an Rathain (Summit of the row of Pinnacles). We sat for a while taking in the views across Loch Torridon and over to Skye, chatting about our adventures over the years and more to come in the future.
From all the countries I have visited in the world, home will always amaze me, It's all too easy to take it for granted, but days like these remind you of why Scotland was voted the most beautiful country in the world...
Check out the full film and let us know what you think!
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