A treat this week as renowned climber, lecturer and writer Andy Kirkpatrick
takes us into his world. We asked him why Scottish winter is special and he
came back in typically idiosyncratic style.
The Andy K Scottish show is a three part drama: the road trip; the dark art
of the gnarl and why Scotland is the new Patagonia.
Enjoy.
The treacherous road stretches on into the night, its snow-covered surface unchecked by the yellow sleeping ploughs that hide in laybys.
With eyelids heavy with the weight of so many miles, so many hours sitting looking at nothing but dull grey road, we take turns sitting, tired and hunkered against the wheel, peering out into the blackness, nose almost pressed against the damp glass, trying to keep the car within the boundary of road, icy tarmac and deep heather that is uniformly white.
"Keep talking to me!" the driver shouts, fearful of sleep. And so we plan what we'll do tomorrow or is it today, as we pass by large startled creatures, that run along beside us for a moment, caught in our light like hairy horned dolphins.
Seven hours down - one more to go.
Snow blows out of the black night and in through the open door, the car rocked by the wind, and by four moving bodies trying to fight their way into sleeping bags before the dawn.
Cramped like four astronauts in the exhausted Metro, surrounded by the ornaments of our long journey, bottles of flat pop, stale crisps and staler garage sandwiches, we chatter in the dark - all as excited as children on Christmas Eve - knowing the small amount of sleep ahead of us is no more then a formality.
It seems like seconds of sleep pass before the alarm rings, but looking at the clock it's actually minutes. We struggle out of our bags, eating the rest of our supplies as we don our stretchy layers of fleece, clean and untainted. We know from experience that we are wearing too much and will have to stop once underway, but we don't care as long as we're warm now.
As ever there is always one really keen climber, the first up, and one not so keen, the one who hides in the back among the trash, hoping to be forgotten, left behind in their bag of feathers.
Axes and boots fall from the overflowing boot with a familiar clatter, and so the search begins.
"Where's my hammer?" someone asks with no one listening.
"Have you seen my other boot," he says once his hammer comes to hand, his boot hidden under the driver's seat, and left there until his curses of frustration trigger laughter in everyone who is in on the joke.
Once the sound of climbers swearing and straining, pulling tired Yetis over battered boots has passed we know all is ready.
"Come on!" shout the Alpinist and first timer - keen, packed and ready to go.
"What?" answer the old timers, sitting on the edge of the boot, rolling cigarettes, looking at the rat chewed guide. "What's the rush?"
The snow falls lazily through the headtorch beams, a motley selection of light - halogen, LED - from batteries old and new, all trampled by four thundering pairs of boots, feet numb and clumsy, unused to their bulk and weight so early in the season.
"I'll catch you up," someone shouts, scuttling off the path urgently, the day-old prawn sandwich returning for runny retribution.
Breaking out of the steep valley onto the ridge, they feel the wind building, sending them scrambling for hats and gloves removed on the sweaty climb.
They stand together again on the ridge, feeling like they are the only people in the universe, watching the Scottish dawn break dull, gray and unpromising through the cloud, the crags taking shape through the snow and rain.
"We have conditions," someone shouts in a mock Victorian voice - and they all chuckle together, all friends.
And so they all file down the hill looking for the treasure they have travelled so far to find.
