Adventure Course

Dylan Matthew

It's 1982 and I'm 14. It's the North West tip of Scotland in late spring. We're all awoken in the middle of the night and told to get dressed quickly. 'Hiking boots! Waterproofs! Maps! Compasses! Survival bags! Bring the lot!' Whatever's happening right now isn't on the itinerary.

We assembled in the dining room for a pre mission briefing as the wind and rain lashed their whips against the building. The 'Chief' addressed us. Mountain Rescue had received a distress call about two hillwalkers who went missing yesterday. There's a second report of a distress flare being seen near the mountain of Foinaven ten miles East. The weather's too bad for a helicopter search and they've called us up for assistance. There's already one search team out there and we've been asked to cover more ground. Time was of the essence.

We had our motivation: we had lives to save. An hour later there were fifteen torches in front of fifteen weather battered teenagers and two Course Leaders snaking single file across a pitch-black barren nothingness. The weather worsened and we took shelter in an abandoned croft. The croft floor was like leather made from years of sheeps***. We tried to get some kip but the smell and the wind tearing past made it impossible.

Dawn broke and we made our way to the search area and spent the day looking into the distance for two small specs of humanity. The wind maintained its strength all day and toward nightfall it picked up. We reached a semi sheltered corrie on the slopes of Foinaven; a giant blade of barren rock slicing almost 3000ft into the sky. We hadn't found our quarry and it was too long a hike back to base. The big tents were brought out.

As we erected the tents, the wind took an almighty breath and exhaled with a noise I shall never forget. One tent ripped apart in a second. Another, not quite completely pegged down took off and flew away. We watched the remaining tent lacerate itself to death on the poles leaving skewered strips of useless flapping fabric.

Ought Oh.

We're in trouble now. The expression on the Course Leaders faces was the full stop. They hurriedly discussed a plan glancing up at the huge shoulder of Foinaven wrapped around us. On a steep slope nearby were dozens of giant boulders the size of cars and vans that had over the years broken off and tumbled down into a football field sized heap. The resulting jigsaw of abstract chaos created sheltered gaps and small caves.

The decision was made. Get into groups of three or four and find shelter. We had to get into our sleeping and survival bags and huddle together.

I got together with my only real mates in the group, Morph and Tara. I'd clicked with Tara straight off and fancied her a bit so I happily imagined the inevitable huddle. We found our cave high up between three giant boulders. Two boulders came together to form a steep 'V' shaped floor, which sloped down into the cave's interior. The top boulder made a roof of sorts. The wind and rain still got in but it wasn't bad.

I bedded down on the cave floor. Morph and Tara would have to lie on top of me, all of us wedged together by the rock surfaces. As the tallest person it meant they could lie on me without too much discomfort. The other way around would have meant someone would have been completely smothered. It was reasonably painful and uncomfortable but it was better than being outside, and of course, Tara would be close.

The Course Leaders came round every cave checking everyone off a list, making sure we were warm and safe and had eaten something. They were impressed with our find, it was the best of the lot. I doubted we or anyone else would get a wink of sleep in these conditions, certainly not with the constant bestial roar of the wind as it raced across this alien moonscape and whistled through the boulders.

Incredibly we all passed out together in a wet, exhausted tryst. I awoke for a short period to find half of Tara's head and long wet straw hair pressed against my face as she slept on and along the right side of my body. Morph had taken the left. This was closest I'd ever been to a girl that I liked. Yes it was definitely worth all the pain and hardship for this. I would have wrapped my arms around her but I was constrained by the sleeping bag and trapped by both her and Morph's weight. Sleep took me again.

I woke at dawn. Something wasn't right. Tara and Morph were crouching at my feet gripping my legs with their hands through the sleeping bag. They looked afraid. I noticed we'd all somehow slid further down into the cave.

'Morning' I said and let out a huge yawn. I stretched my arms out, behind me and brought them down behind my head so I could lie back. But neither my hands nor head touched a surface. I felt disorientated. I flapped an arm around to try and hold on to something but there was nothing to hold on to, no surface to touch to my immediate side, behind me or underneath. 'Don't move' Tara said quietly.

The top third of my body was hanging over the edge of a precipe into a dark void. I leaned forward and grabbed the sides of the cave walls ahead of me. 'Pull' I shouted. After a few minutes of awkward constricted oomphing, shifting, shoogling and gripping wet rock my body lay fully on rock surface. Tara and Morph retreated to give me room to manoeuvre. I got out the bag and turned around, facing into the cave.

I found a small rock and threw it down into the blackness and listened for it to clack off the bottom and give me an idea of how deep it was. We never heard a 'clack' come back. We got a bigger stone and dropped it and once again heard nothing. Only now that I was safe again did fear and shock wash over me as it hit me how close I'd come to dying. We never talked about it after that and it was only days later that I realized they had saved my life. I wonder if they tell their version of it to someone else.