Three mountains down, one to go

On the way down to Carrantuohill in County Kerry this morning, one of the two Kilcullen members of a three-man Kildare team doing the Vauxhall Four Peaks Challenge told the Diary of the extreme conditions they've faced in climbing the first three peaks on the 48-hour programme.


Carrantuohill, courtesy Wikipedia.

Mark Phelan, who is climbing with fellow Kilcullen man Enda O'Neill, and Joe Duane from Newbridge, said they have to be down off Carrantuohill by 4pm today to achieve the goal of climbing the four highest peaks in these islands in a two-day period.

"Ben Nevis on Thursday was an absolute killer," Mark said this morning. "Nothing could have prepared us for that mountain, even though we are all fit and have all trained. We did well, though - we were the last ones to start, but we actually passed 17 teams up and down."

At the bottom of the mountain the temperature was 27deg but it was freezing at the top, with snow on the last sections towards the summit. The team made it up and down the mountain in four hours and 20 minutes, in what Mark figures was a 25-kilometre trek.

Though the original challenge was to climb Scafell Pike in the English Lake District next, that was changed for logistical reasons, and instead the Challenge brought them to Helvellyn in Cumbria. "Scaffell Pike was considered to be too dangerous this time. Helvellyn was short and sharp, extremely tough, almost straight up in steps, but we did it in two hours 15 minutes. It actually took us longer to come down than to go up."

Snowdon in Wales was yesterday afternoon's challenge, with 'a lot of flat bits and a lot of sharp bits'. "But the weather was horrific - it rained from the start to the finish and up at the top we had a storm and the winds were horrendous. Everybody was really demoralised at that point, but all the teams stuck together and we got there, in three hours 15 minutes for the trip."

The County Kildare trio start Carrantuohill at 11am today. The Diary will report on how they managed the final leg in late afternoon.

Mark and Enda run Maptech 3D Solutions Ltd, the Link Business Park, Kilcullen.

Brian Byrne.