August 2010

8 months post transplant

My climbing continued to progress with some multi pitch routes at the beginning of the month where I took my turn to lead. This boded well for September when I would be going off with friends from my climbing club for a week’s climbing on Lundy. This was a trip which had been booked back in December when I was in hospital having my bone marrow transplant. At the time it had seemed difficult to imagine being back rock climbing again but it had become a goal and now looked as if it might just happen. The only problem was that the other climbers who were going like to climb the harder grades and I wasn’t near that level yet.

Another goal, first visualised in the hospital back in December was to climb Suilven – a mountain in Scotland which had been on my wish list for many years. Not the highest of the Scottish peaks at 2,400ft it nonetheless is an iconic mountain, rising as it does straight out of the glacial, lochan strewn wilderness of Sutherland, a striking landmark for miles. Nick had brought a postcard of it into hospital, one that had been sent to me by my sister some time previously and from that time it had become fixed in my mind. It had become the focus for our main holiday and so it was that we set off once again up to Scotland in mid August.

We took our bikes with us and following a suggestion from number 2 son (a keen mountain biker) we set off on a bright day (but with a poor forecast) to cycle to a loch up behind Kinlochleven. He had mentioned that there was a bit of uphill to start with but after 2 miles of pushing the bikes up the very steep track the novelty was beginning to wear off. And then it started to rain..... ...I found a discarded rain jacket several sizes too big for me which I put over my shower proof jacket and that kept the worst of the rain off for a while until it set in to a steady downpour. We were sure the loch couldn’t be too far away and pressed on determined to have some reward for our efforts. We were now up high enough to see what weather was coming our way from the west – more rain and plenty of it in sagging black clouds. By this time we were drenched to the skin despite the extra jacket, the light had faded to a gloom and the temperature had dropped considerably. Up ahead we saw a building which we took to be linked to the dam which we expected at the end of the loch and so we continued on. However, on reaching the building we only discovered a level, concrete covered conduit running beside the track which was still climbing upwards. (We discovered later that had we cycled along the conduit at this point, we would have had a level ride right to the dam at the end of the loch).We set ourselves a turning point, a tree on the skyline and headed for it. Still no sight of the loch but a distant view down into a very deep valley – had we really come up that far from sea level? We decided we really needed to have a map next time and with our minds full of what we might say to our son, along with the frustration of not reaching our goal; we turned around and headed downhill. It was so steep and twisting that at times it was too dangerous to cycle – even more frustrating having to push the bikes downhill as well! However on the straighter parts we managed to reach quite a speed, hurtling over bumps, the bikes rattling, literally a bone shaking ride without the benefit of suspension. It was with great pleasure, that we eventually reached the car, dry clothes and warmth.

We had intended to take the kayaks with us but when we were offered the chance to borrow a friend’s campervan (which had a domed roof and so could not transport them), we decided instead to make use of that and leave the kayaking to another time. Our arrangements involved meeting up in Fort William and swapping our car for their VW camper. I’m not sure that Morrisons completely approved of our transferring mountains of clothes and dirty washing between the two vehicles in their car park but I think we balanced it out with stocking up on supplies in their shop. Our friend and her sons had just completed a Highland tour and were now going to take our car back to where they lived in Northumberland. We would swap back after around 10 days.

We had quite an adventure touring round the remote but beautiful north west of Scotland in the campervan, choosing lay-bys to park up in at night with beautiful views to wake up to in the morning. The weather was variable and as we drew closer to Suilven we carefully chose our day for the ascent. Reading up on the route we discovered that although the mountain itself was not terribly high in terms of Scottish peaks, there was a very long walk-in. We had parked the night before as close as we could to it and had chatted to a couple who had just returned from it. I asked how far they had walked and they produced their pedometer. It showed an eleven and a half mile round trip – and that was only to the bottom of the mountain! We had decided we would cycle as far as we could before having to walk and hoped to save ourselves a few miles walking. The day dawned - superb weather with a gin clear sky. We set off around 9.15am past a loch with Suilven perfectly reflected in the still water. After about a mile and a half it was clear that Nick’s bike was not going to make it. Steep uphill pulls on the rough track caused the chain to come off and so we had to abandon the bikes and strike out on foot. About half of the walk-in was on a this track, the other half was across rising tiers of very boggy ground where it was possible to sink down a foot or so in to sucking black peat.

Suilven has three summits and the tops are reached by first climbing to the saddle between two of the them.This climb is relatively steep but does not take very long. It was some time since I had climbed anything so steep and I did have to pause from time to time to “look at the view”. When the saddle is reached, the summit rises almost a mile to the right. The views from here are amazing, miles and miles of moorland scattered with hundreds of lochs and further views out to the west to the Outer Hebrides. We decided that since we had made it this far we should do all three summits. This was not as easy as it seemed as Suilven is around 3 miles in length and there is a considerable dip between the summits. The final summit also demands rock climbing skills and care is needed if you do not have a rope.(We did not have a rope!) Having completed all three tops we returned to the saddle and began the descent. Another half dozen people were also on the mountain that day but we were the only ones to attempt the three summits so were last to descend. It was a long trek back but eventually we reached the bikes and cycled back to the van. It was a great day out and had taken us nine hours of pretty much continuous walking – a memorable day and well worth the effort. It felt really good to have achieved a goal set back in the hospital in December at a time when it was an effort to get out of bed to go to the toilet. Those daily spells pedalling the exercise bike were the start of the long road to this moment. We were a bit creaky for the next couple of days but gradually recovered and continued on our tour but kept to short cycles and fairly gentle walks from then on. We were tempted to climb another mountain – Ben Hope. It is attractively situated, right by a road but when we passed it, it was already mid afternoon and too late to start out. – Perhaps another time.

On return from the holiday I had my usual hospital check-up. Because of the way the system works, the blood results are often not back from the lab before I see the doctor and so some months I don’t know my blood results until four weeks later .However, in August the Haemoglobin was 131!, the White blood cell count was 4.8, the Neutrophils 3.8 and the Platelets 200 . Apart from the platelets which were down slightly, all the others had improved significantly! The following day I went to my local hospital for my usual monthly dose of pentamadine which is given by nebuliser (not very pleasant- mildly caustic and makes you dribble). Although the nurses said that it is often only given for 6 months, the docs apparently want me to keep having it.