Their story, in their words….
For our mark evison challenge we travelled to Scotland where we camped for 4 days, and on each of the days we visited a different landmark. On the first day we visited the stall falls which were about 2 hours away from our campsite and took about an hour to climb. The weather was relatively good on the way there but it did start raining just as we got there which made the journey back more challenging, however we managed to get back to the campsite, thought it took longer for us to make our way down the path to the stall falls as the rocks which were on it were wet and very slippery.
On the second day we visited the old Inverlochy Castle which was located close to the nearest town, Fort William. We walked for about an hour from the campsite to the castle, but it was definitely worth it. The castle was free to visit and that allowed us to take a lot of pictures near the stone walls, and the stairs which we couldn’t get to the top of as the second floor was closed off. On that day we also got to visit the river Lochy which was located right next to the castle, as we had an extra spare hour before we had to go back to the campsite so we decided to use it in order to get some pictures of the scenery and some of the wildlife and plants along the way.
On the third day we climbed the Ben Nevis via the tourist route which was situated near to the campsite opposite the youth hostel. It took us about 4 hours on both the way up and down but we think it was worth it, the view there is amazing, and we were amazed to see the different plants that grew up there, we even saw some sheep which we took pictures of.
The overall experience definitely challenged us mentally more so than physically, all of the challenges which we attempted seemed more difficult than they actually were when we attempted them, which did give us a sense of relief. We learned a lot about what living outdoors was like as well, having to put up a tent, cook using a little stove and also sorting our bags without overpacking. The experience has definitely helped us in several ways, mainly has taught us how to survive in the wilderness, but also has taught us the importance of spending time in nature, the whole experience really did take us out of our comfort zone in the city and put us in a situation which challenged us, but did not overwhelm us, which I think helped us grow a lot, and develop a different view of what it is like to be out in the wild.
