3 men and 2 dogs for this one. My Chocolate Lab and my friends Collie.
Started to go up the long road to the bottom of the hill and came across the big mama cows and their calfs. Lets just say they were not to pleased to see us, so we had a slight detour before rejoining the road.
We took the 1st exit after the bridge rather than the 2nd which is only about 100mt further on.
Boy was this a boggy route or what.
The rain was off and on like a tap, but as my daughter always says to me "your skin is water proof" The mist was quite heavy in patches as well.
Easy enough climb i felt to about 3/4 of the way up and one of my friends took us the steep way to the top, i think he forgot we had 2 dogs in tow.
My dog is not exactly the lightest and weighs in about 33kg. One of the guys climbed up onto a ledge, whilst i grabbed my dogs collar to balance her and shoved her up so far whilst the other guy grabbed the collar and pulled her up to the ledge. We had to do this a further 3 times. Beats doing weights at the gym.
When we got to the summit it was a case of stay low to avoid getting blown of the hill, get a couple of photos then start the decent to hide out the elements.
We found a slightly different track for the way of the top to avoid the lifting of the dogs.
The website does state there is a slightly easier approach to the top but when the mist is heavy you go with whats in front of you.
The dog was obviously ok as she was still heading to every mud puddle for a splash. Then she dived at what she must have thought was a shallow mud bath. Boy was she wrong. All i could see was the top of her head. She managed to eventually crawl out after about a minute of struggling.
We headed down with no ther mishaps.
We took the other path on the way down which was less boggy.
All in all i found this a great wee hill. As i have said in previous blogs its nice to test yourself, and near to the top of this one it certainly was a test to get myself up the steep rock climbs never mind getting my dog up.
Ben Vane is at the bottom of the pile regards height, but definetley a test and enjoyable.
Couple of weeks holiday now, and hopefully try Ben Nevis on my return.