Halloween Hills

2020 style Halloween lantern.

I am only writing about this now as I haven’t felt very…well…bloggy in recent months (is that an adjective or have I just made that up?) I suspect it’s an effect of lockdown as much as anything else, its not really giving me much in the way of mountain related adventures to write about is it? and even less to look forward to so it seems at times. Sitting here in the city centre in yet another lockdown looking back at past adventures on the hills has at times been a little depressing but at the same time I guess its good to have those adventures to look back on. If this pandemic has taught us anything it is that time and freedom are not things to be squandered lightly. 

This was an idea of Jason’s, a torchlit Halloween run up and down Morven thus ensuring that I have now run up and down Morven more times in the dark than I have in daylight. As per usual for any Morven run, work commitments made me late in leaving Aberdeen and my usual attempt on the land speed record in a ever so slightly clapped out 15 year old Mazda ensued but even the best attempts of my poor little car were not enough and as I screeched into the car park I could see the row of headtorches heading up the slope of the mountain into the enveloping darkness. I quickly hauled on a waterproof top, chucked a spare headtorch battery into my backpack along with a chocolate bar and scampered up the field to the foot of the field in pursuit of the headtorches. Happily, the row of headtorches had come to a halt as they spotted me and kindly waited and it wasn’t too long before I caught up. 

The climb up

We climbed up the usual walker’s path squelching through the boggy bits chatting away. It was not particularly cold to start with but as always the exposed ridge had a cold wind swirling across it and it was noticeable how the temperature dropped there as ice crystals were starting to form on the ground higher up. Behind us the sky was fading to a deep blue with a pinky glow on the horizon and it really didn’t seem too long before we were at the summit and sheltering behind the cairn to pull on warmer layers. 

Colin and Bob had come prepared with Halloween costumes – I had failed to find my grim reaper costume which is inevitably hauled out of the attic for every Halloween event and so I borrowed Colin's crow puppet and we did our best to look suitably scary – not there was anybody to scare on the summit of Morven in the Friday night in the dark on the last day of October but that’s not the point, its the thought that counts. We hung round the summit taking photos of the summit cairn enjoying the clear night with the backdrop of a full moon and the lights twinkling in the distance. A moments freedom from the next seemingly inevitable lockdown.

The summit of Morven

Halloween costumes stowed away in backpacks, we descended by the race route which at times caused a little route-finding-in-the dark-based-discussion (it always happens, even in daylight) and squelched our way back down through the boggy tracks and through the field past the derelict cottage (derelict in most people’s opinion, nice little "do-er upper" in my opinion) to the car park. Little mini adventures on the mountains like this are perfect, when the next easing of lockdown comes I will be grabbing the chance to do many more as they are not something to be taken for granted.

Photo Credit Bob E

Photo Credit Bob E