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Sunday was to be my no faffing big loop around three 1100 metre or so peaks high above the three sister’s valley in Glencoe.
The forecast was just about right and breaking camp at 7.00am gave me plenty of time to cook breakfast and be among the first pair of boots into Coire Nam Lochan that morning. I made reasonable pace for an old guy and despite the unnecessarily heavy pack had covered two miles up the mountain in little over two hours before stopping for my first café crème of the day.
- The Three Sisters
The amphitheatre around me was the impressive albeit intimidating Stob Coire Nam Lochan ridge with its 3,655-foot jagged summit in my sights. I was just beginning my ascent of the ridge proper when at around 2,900 feet a couple in their late teens appear from behind one of the huge rocks strewn across this part of the mountain. The young lad looked extremely pleased to see me and as he moved precariously toward me on all fours, I presumed he had twisted an ankle or something of that sort. His sister, as it turned out, was moving with much more grace and balance and unlike her brother did not look quite as panic stricken about their situation.
- Coire Nam Lochan
They were visiting from the Netherlands and had set off early that morning from Glencoe village with parents and a younger sibling to picnic somewhere in the hidden valley. After around an hour or so in the parents had decided the terrain was a bit too challenging and turned back with the younger sibling leaving the older kids to continue alone.
After consultation with an apple watch the pair realised they were much higher than the hidden valley and as I pointed out, three times higher in the wrong direction.
Ill equipped for pathless mountainous terrain with no map, compass or other means of navigation, they were well and truly lost and to make matters worse, the lad’s contorted face was painful evidence of his acute vertigo.
There and then I made the decision to abandon my three-summit day and guide the pair back to at least the safety of the glen where they could follow a well-defined path back to the main road.
- The intimidating Stob Coire Nam Lochan Ridge
My strategy involved summiting Stob Coire Nam Lochan to take the slightly easier route descending the east ridge. I’d make three hand loops with the thirty metre rope I had packed (you never know when you’ll need it) and give the unsteady of the two my helmet for comfort. I often carry a helmet where there’s risk of displaced rock from climbers above me as a stone the size of a soap bar is enough to knock you out or worse!
Less than fifteen minutes into my plan my guy froze telling me he could go no further; he was completely crag-fast adding another layer of complexity to our already problematic descent. You must sympathise with fear and understand that what seems completely doable for one person is another’s worst nightmare. This pretty much sums up the situation I found myself in.
New strategy. I’d tuck them somewhere relatively safe and make the 50 metres or so to summit on my own on the off chance there was anyone up there who could help. I’d also salvage at least one mountain and a selfie (or two) that day. I set them up on a flat piece of sheltered rock assuring them I’d be back in under twenty minutes and not to move from the spot. At the summit I met what I believe were an Italian family comprising two adults and two small children travelling in another direction. I instantly decided to descend back to my new Dutch friends and get them down under my own steam but what happened next will baffle me for months to come.
- View over to Bidean nam Bian
If you are reading this and are familiar with the area, you’ll know how easy it is to go off route, particularly in a rain cloud where poor visibility can momentarily make navigation a bit more challenging. For this very reason I had plotted the sibling’s location so I could easily find them en-route and had explained this to them so they wouldn’t move.
Two independent GPS devices and a small cairn I’d pointed out confirmed I was within 5 to 10 metres of the exact location but astonishingly the pair were nowhere to be seen. I swept the area in a wider circle but still no sign of anyone above or below me.
It would have been inconceivable to think they had gone higher so I began the descent in as best a search format as I could, constantly peering into the abys beneath the ridge edge in case they had fallen. Still no sign.
A bank of cloud had moved in with hailstone and 50-60mph gusts creating zub-zero temperatures. It was no time to be dithering at this height, so I continued to descend hoping I’d find them huddled out of the wind lower down.
- Amazing views
Dropping down to 500 metres was like another climate, the sun had come out and I stopped to de-layer and get some food in to my energy zapped body. Now back on the well etched path I was confident their younger limbs would have taken them swiftly down to safety and there was little cause for me to be looking for two near hypothermic teenagers clinging to a rock.
My heart sank at the next bend as the three sister’s car park came into view where although still some 300 metres below me, the blue flashing lights of mountain rescue and emergency services were unmistakable. I picked up pace, heart near climbing through my ribs and reached the car park just as the already significant incident crew were pulling out.
- impressive gullies
I managed to flag down the last mountain rescue land rover and between gasping for air was able to give the team member a brief synopsis of my day along with coordinates for where I last saw the Dutch teenagers.
He explained the team had moved their base further along the glen to Achnambeithach and that it was important I come and recount the circumstances to his team leader. Glencoe mountain rescue had been called out earlier in the day to an incident where parents had become separated from two children near the same location and any information I could provide was going to assist in locating and bringing them down to safety.
Incredibly, the call-out was not for two teenagers from the Netherlands but in fact for the Italian looking kids I’d encountered earlier with their parents who were now believed to be alone on the summit of Bidean Nam Bian (3,773 feet). I later learned the children were found safe and well but what happened to the Dutch pair remains a mystery.
- No place to be lost
