Suzanne took herself up to Fort William to settle into her digs for the weekend early on Friday. The Mob consisting finally of Jason, Chris D, Tim, Jeff and Terry K set off in pursuit around 1615 in the GollyMobile, loaded to the gills with five bikes strapped onto the carrier, Jason's splendid but totally untested (unridden!) new Orange Orange Five (not a misprint) reposing atop the other four.
I have been known to compose long spiels for some previous weekenders, but you just wanna hear about the rides so I won't bore you. On second thoughts, the ride report will bore you anyway. Best flip the page now then.
The trip up was interrupted only once when Macky D's in NW Edinburgh got the verdict, and it was nourishing enough. We were quickly back on the road and headed into that absolutely gorgeous Highland landscape, cameras clicking, stags staring at us from every hillside. Volunteer driver and hero Jason soon became the brunt of the digs as we criticised every wheel he dropped off the edge into the dyke and every little swerve, wheelspin and outbraking manoeuvre. But he's got broad shoulders. And the rest of us wanted to be fresh for the morning's little jaunt.
We arrived at the infamous Red Squirrel Camp Site as planned, about 5 hours after leaving home, not bad but we'd been severely hampered by traffic south of the border. MidAirCrisis Village was erected in record time and the fire lit with some very wet logs. Light rain saw the Professor suggesting and Terry constructing a canopy over the camping chairs between two trees so we could still sit outside as Jason's barby was fired up. We sat around taking the hiss till somewhere near midnight before turning in, and seconds later that famous snore rang out through the Glen.
Early risers emerged at 0700 and re-lit the fire before the pans and kettles were ignited for a hearty breakfast. We stowed the bikes inside the van as per normal and set off at 0915 to meet Suzanne in the Nevis Range Visitor Centre at 1000. The bikes were rebuilt and then the discussion turned to which lift pass we were all going for: one-shot or a day pass. Initially Terry said he only wanted a single run, but with the weather looking good he was persuaded to go for the full pass, as was Suzanne, just in case.
Next bit was hard, and ever since he decided to arrange this trip it's been playing on the old Gollum's mind. You must know how he feels about flying unless you've been on Mars. Well, he just couldn't divorce that feeling from the ones he was having about gondolas. In fact, the old guts were churning just looking up the mountain at that little chain of blobs bobbing up and down the mountainside. This was really exciting for the demented old soul, but once he'd managed to hook the Commencal's saddle onto the back of his spaceship and climb in, he felt much better. Oh no he didn't. It wasn't too bad as we left the turning station, but soon after the thing developed a mind of it's own and began to swing from side to side, taking Terry's recent breakfast with it. Yurk!
He started to chatter crazily to Suzanne to take his mind off thoughts of impending doom, trying not to stare out the back window with the Centre becoming an ever-smaller dot in the distance. Taking photos helped a little, but then the ship steadied as the climb got steeper and we headed up towards the misty summit, which calmed him down somewhat. There wasn't any drama detaching the bikes at the top, where we learned that Jay's new Orange had almost slipped off on the way up and had made the trip at a somewhat unconventional angle!
We posed for a piccy outside the lift house then saddled up and followed Jeff up the remaining few hundred metres to the start of the new Red Downhill. We'd seen the video, now we were in our own movie. Terry crept down to the second rock garden and positioned himself to try and grab a decent shot of the others as they dropped past him. We descended in pairs with Jeff and Jason out front, Chris and Tim central and Suzanne and Terry behind, just to try and keep an eye on each other in case of whoopsies. It turned out that we all got down safely with a few dabs here and there but nothing that hurt. It's sure got some steep bits and rocky bits but slightly disappointingly way too much timberwork. And it only has a very worn-looking coating of rubberised paint which doesn't inspire confidence. Wouldn't go near it in the wet, which would make for a whole heap of walking to get to the bits of Terra Firma between. It is, however, a pretty good test of your nerve and technical ability. The other slight disappointment was that as the lumpy section ended and spat you into a few hundred metres of soil-based berms that ended very abruptly on fireroad, with nothing else coming up for a flourish to the end. 530 vertical metres in 1.8 miles ain't bad for a descent though. And a couple of those boardwalk hairpin turns are pretty scary when you see what's over the wrong edge.
We gathered at the cars for some refreshment and to prepare for the next phase, all enthusiastic about the trail and having done it, but also agreeing that the lower reaches lacked something. Once ready to roll, Terry decided he'd just break himself if he tried it any faster and Suzanne was satisfied with her single descent aswell, so while the other four took another gondola ride, the pair of chickens took on the Ten Under The Ben trail starting at the foot of the DH run. Most of the early sections of this were uphill singletracks, not steep though, so still a good ride. However there were only two fast singletrack descents and then a whole load of fireroad climbing around the base of Big Ben and his mates.
About 30 minutes out, who should they run into than the other four, taking a breather at the end of the Red DH again after nailing it on their second runs. We regrouped and cruised down the last swoopy bit over the stream. We had a couple of jaunts into the woods and lapped up all they had to offer before being spat out once more at the car park having covered the far end of the Ten Under The Ben trail aswell, which Suzanne and Terry had missed earlier. Somewhere along the way Tim had a whoopsie when he used a tree to stop his fall but it snapped and dumped him, leaving a damaged right hand as a minima. And elsewhere Jason literally slipped up at the start of a very greasy section of boardwalk which gave his knee a whack, and Jeff skidded off the side of the same green planks with a 180 degree spinout, but that was it for today.
Resting at the end of the Red crossover again, Terry noticed the wide, smooth expanse of shale that he and Suzanne had spied out of the gondola on the way up, thinking it was part of the new Red DH. He started chatting to a full-on Downhiller on a V10 with all the gear, sat there taking a rest. "Is that as smooth as it looks all the way down? Would it kill us XC types if we tried it?" His reply was very satisfying, with the only proviso being "You'll think you're gonna shoot off the end of the world, but its a very low step off at the end of the steepest drop, you'll be fine".
So without having the faintest idea what it was or where it led, Terry was off hammering down the thing with the others in tow. And yes indeed the steep bit is steep, many. Surviving that, there were a few take-off points which could just about be measured as you approached and snatched a glance over the edge, and they were taken pretty smartly. Weird having the wheels this far in the sky without panicking, but the lad said we'd be fine! Then just as a pair of rather wide, flat horizon take-off lips loomed up ahead, Terry noticed something down below, beyond them, that he thought he recognised. With the Meta way up off the deck again and sailing without his help he didn't have too many microseconds to identify it, but between that jump and the final similar one directly ahead, the stark realisation that we were now on Steve Peat's personal landing strip dawned on him, big style.
Yes, with that final jump and landing executed reasonably well he screeched to a halt just before piling into "those railings". And the flash of green he'd seen in the distance? - the spectator seating at the end of the infamous FORT BILL WORLD CUP DOWNHILL! Now I know what Ian B meant when he told me how this could hurt you easily, but somehow we all got away with it on the smooth lower reaches. Jeff, in his haste to lead our current adventure, had shot off up the way and not seen us all turn down onto this mental thing. He was put out enough to turn and ride back up the hill to do it on his own, and came back down fairly carefully with the same conclusion as the rest of us - awesome!
Coffee shop was next on the agenda. We stacked the bikes outside and piled in, stuffing cake into adrenalin-lined, slavering chops, enthusing over our accidental accomplishment (and enjoying the cakes, of course). All that action and we were all still largely unscathed, bonus. That gondola pass had just become the Gollum's most prized possession, what a memory this is, especially at his advanced years.
The Committee met again with the result that we would now all do the Witches Trail and the World Cup XC course, plus whatever else we came across. First off that included the Skills Loop, something Tim now has a fetish for, so we booled around the corner and did the triple drop-offs there, or some of us did. Then we were off onto the Witches to sample its delights. The signs soon turned to World Cup arrows, or we missed a turn. Whatever, it didn't matter as we did a good-sized singletrack climb which turned into a fireroad one before reaching the top of the Black and taking a short breather. More scenic berm pictures taken here, let's hope they're usable.
Not much left here now that we hadn't seen so we decided to call it a day around 1530 and head home for tea. We followed Suzanne back to her second stopover hotel at Onich on the end of the fabulous Loch Linnhe so we'd know where to meet her in the morning. Back to site for an evening of everlasting daylight with the fire ever bigger and the barby ever fuller following a visit to Morrisons meat counter on the way home. We even sneaked into the woods outside the camp site to plunder some dry timber which would make the fire much easier to bring to life this time. Bedtime came around 2315 and the heaviest rain a little later. Snore.