mountain tortoise wrote:I like the "5 hours up and 3 hours down bit". Sounds just like me. I have my own little way of decided if I should do a route...Summer - 8 miles, 3000 feet of total ascent, and no spark pointy places....
So you can all work out where I will never get. I never do ... Ring of Steall ... I have walked hundreds of miles in Scotland but only go up sometimes, but that does not make it any less enjoyable.
It is good to know and understand one's limits, and to be prepared, but I suspect that the undercurrent in this thread is (generally) right:
- Experience tends to over-equip or be excessively cautious.
- Inexperience invariably under-equips or is obsessively bold.
I've got a a place now (with the kids both in their teens, finally) where I can cut back on my pack size, but even so, I only need one hand and my nose to count the Munros we summited last year without my 4man survival bothy in my backpack (and four of them were on the Ring of Steall!). It only came out once, but hey... We also haven't used the whistles I insist everyone carries, or the first aid kit, space blankets, survival bags (although it has saved me once!), emergency mint cakes and cereal bars, or the torches, penknive and spare top I also habitually pack. But one day, I may need them - chances are not for my party either!
And given my party, Tortoise, I'd suggest that the Ring could fit within your parameters (on a good day) if you start at the top park, go round clockwise, and then wait at the lower car park for pick-up after coming off the last hill to NNW, rather than NE (which is a b*****r). The Devils ridge lower opt-out only has one step that I felt was exposed, and the rest of the scrambly bits are three good points of contact all the way round. But as I said - it's good to understand your own limits!