Charity trek to Ben Nevis

Friday 4th July - went on a charity trek to Ben Nevis, in aid of the Love Water Love Life campaign run by Muslim Aid.

Despite the long and arduous coach trip to the Scottish Highlands which took over 13 hours each way I was really looking forward to climbing the highest mountain in the United Kingdon. Standing at a mighty 4,406 feet this would surely provide a worthy challenge !

On the coach I started to size up the fellow trekkers, to understand who I needed to look out for. Although it was a charity trek, I am very competitive in nature and wanted to understand the main players.....what worried me initially was the relatively young age of the walkers. With youth on their side, could this trek expose me as the middle aged chacha ji with very dodgy knees - Clearly I needed to find out more about the competitors............

Listening to the youngsters for thirty minutes on the coach, my worries were easily calmed and I knew that this trek was mine for the taking.

Profile of main characters;

# 1 - Commando GPS. Club level swimmer, up at the crack of dawn and eager as a beaver. He was the gadget king, but in the wilderness Duracell batteries don't come in handy - what you need is raw energy like Bear Grylls. That was going to be his weakness and Shere Khan (that's me - the desi version of Bear Grylls) had plently of grit and determination to march on when others would start to fall behind.

#2 - Dark Stallion. This chap was a talkaholic, the only time he shut up was when he was asleep.....oh and when he started walking too. Clearly the strain of walking uphill for several hours sapped his energy reserves and the brain had to divert the energy from his mouth to the legs. With no words coming out of his mouth, his lips never the less kept on motoring like a goldfish....resulting in excess bloating of his stomach as he was swallowing air !
The Dark Stallion ended up being the last farting king of Scotland......pppprrrrrppppp.


#3 - Bollywood star. Camera, Lights & Action.....I was worried about this guy, he was planning a trek to Karakoram in a few months time. Could this chap be the front runner ? Initially I thought this was the case, but slowly when his amateur dramatics started coming out I was pleasantly relieved. I mean Bollywood stars have limited stamina, I've never seen a star perform a dance in one routine......it's all cut, cut & cut and lots of editing with a double often stepping in. Clearly this chap would be too busy posing for the photo shoots and not focussed enough on the long march to the top of the mountain. This was evident at the waterfall, at the start, at the bridge, at 100m, at 200m..............etc etc etc

#4 - Back Packer. This guy was young, lean & fit. He had recently trekked to the top of Mount Kilimanjaro which is the highest mountain (19,340 feet) in Africa and dwarfs Ben Nevis. This chap was definitely odds on favorite in my book until I learnt that he had just returned from a traveling holiday in South East Asia. I sensed that the the Bangkok excursion would have affected his CHI energy and his performance would be adversely affected.


Clearly my people watching skills paid handsome dividends as my predictions came true, the march to the peak long but my industrious legs kept pumping away and from a group of nearly forty walkers I was the 2nd to the summit beaten by only by a younger and more energetic Samir. BIG UP to Samir the man, you walked up the mountain a boy and came down a man.

But on a serious note, the trek to Ben Nevis was a wonderful experience. To conquer the highest peak on this Island, to witness the fantastic views and to push myself for a good cause and meet some great characters in the process was a joy. Thrashing all the youngsters made me feel good too and hopefully I inspired some of my fellow walkers to train harder for the next challenge.

Remember the man in front is a chacha.........so be respectful and stay behind him.

Carry on Camping

There is nothing like the great outdoors, we're talking Marlboro country.....rugged landscapes. OK we're not in cowboy territory but the Roaches in the Peak District is a close substitute for us city slickers.

Packing in a trek of the Roaches (a rare rock formation rises steeply to 1,657ft) and camping in the peak district sounded like a fantastic adventure, and so it unfolded.

Friday afternoon and rushing up the M40 in a Peugeot 207 SW rental car which had a very bad odour fuming from the carpets was not the most pleasant of journeys. Initially I blamed one of the passengers (Q) as the smell was very cheese & onion sweaty socks type, but this was quickly denied and we realised that the carpet in the rear had been soiled by the previous occupiers.

Arriving at the Farmhouse camp site at 9pm left us with a frantic rush to set up the tent as dusk was creeping upon us, fortunately teamwork was the order of the day and we successfully managed to set up camp and even cook some snacks.

We learnt our first lesson, it gets very cold outdoors! the temperature started to drop considerably overnight and if it wasn't the cold that kept us awake it was the noise of the traffic rumbling along the Buxton Road. In the middle of the night the silence would be broken on a regular interval by trucks, cars and even motorbikes travelling along this stretch of road. At times it felt like we had set up camp on a busy roundabout !

If the traffic was a challenge to our sleep, then a radio blaring from another tent and Q farting the night away was simply torture. Having slept for only a couple of hours, we were pleasantly woken by the beautiful sunrise creeping over the green hilly pastures. This was the perfect time to knock up some breakfast and start marching.

The trek to the Roaches started off gently but once Fiaz saw a steep vertical climb there was no stopping him. This chap has a very sharp radar which misses out nothing at all, and the 1,600 ft climb was well on its way.

Despite the bitter coldness and persistent rain we continued our trek along the Roaches heading towards Luds Church - a deep millstone grit chasm created by a massive landslip. This amazing landslips looked like something out of the set of an Indiana Jones film...... quite possibly "Indian Jones and the search for the crystal fruit bowl".

So a good walk, some fantastic bird watching despite the persistent rain and cold conditions and lack of sleep. When we returned to our tent we could not face another nights sleeping under the axles of lorries & trucks so headed to Birmingham to enjoy a nice curry and refuel our bodies.

From Team to Eam

April 26th 2008 and the first trek of the year in Cheddar Gorge.

Spring was definitely in the air, with the sun shining on us as we climbed the 100 metre heights of the UK's largest gorge. My lunch box weighed me down as I struggled to make my way up to the top of the cliffs, in hindsight 3 litres of fluid, 3 sub rolls, 2 energy bars, 5 bananas, 4 apples were maybe a little too much. Clearly I need to carry less of the food mountain and climb more !!

The challenge for me is now to improve my fitness and be ready for the next climb at the end of May in the Peak district, this time I'll be leading from the front for sure !

Our long serving buddy Tiger Tony aka Tari aka Tahir aka "T" a veteran of many a walk let down the boys and failed to turn up, hence the Team without "T" ended up as an EAM.

A message to T - papa stop making excuses, and get your butt down to the Peak district next month ! We sense that you're under the thumb, don't be a caged tiger it's time to roam free & enjoy the great outdoors with the lads.

As the pictures show the EAM had a great time, we even discovered our very own Mission Impossible stunt man ready to abseil from nearly 400 feet !!!