I had been over to this area of the estate once before with Dougie but I've never been to the Ben Hope cabin so I wasn't very familiar with the route we took, also the weather had really began to close in with more snow and mist so visibility wasn't the best. The cabin is perched high up on the hillside and whilst there is an access track for vehicles we couldn't use it this day as it was to steep, although he did make a couple of attempts. I suppose the whole day would have turned out different had we been able to drive up to the cabin as planned. As it was he drove some way around the hill and abandoned the Land Rover in favour of walking. Without a word he jumped out of the Land Rover, got his tool bag out of the back and set off at a pace to the foot of the hill and then continued straight up the steep slope to the track that we had to abandon with the Land Rover. Once on the track he followed it up hill. It was a more gentle climb along the track but by this time I had fallen some distance behind him on account of the ski suit being to big and cumbersome for me and my wellington boots being so slippery in the snow. I had to climb the steep hill to the track mostly by pulling myself up with my hands which were now freezing. Luckily because the sleeves were long on the suit I was able to pull my hands up inside them once on the track soon warmed them back up again. Because grandfather had now disappeared into the ever worsening conditions I gave up on the silent treatment and shouted for him to wait. I heard him reply but I couldn't hear what it was he said so I tried my best to catch up. I was simply following his tracks in the snow by now but the further we went even they were getting harder to see. It was really strange, there was just whiteness everywhere, nothing else, no depth to anything, I couldn't even tell where the edge of the track was until I wandered off it. I was getting a bit scared now so I shouted to grandfather again and said I needed him to wait. His reply this time came above and to my left and not in front of me as I expected it would. I could tell he was angry too. This time I did hear him telling me to go back and wait for him at the Land Rover. This made me angry now because that wasn't the agreement, he just didn't want me with him for whatever reason and that was that. I may as well not have come if all I was going to do was sit and wait for him in the Land Rover.
Looking back I think the anger and frustration I felt probably distracted me enough to clouded my judgment. I was to preoccupied with thinking of ways to drop him in it with Ms Oliver when we got back that I missed where I needed to leave the track for the Land Rover. It didn't help either that our tracks were now gone and I could see absolutely nothing. The snow was falling thick and fast, big massive flakes as big as golf balls. I only realised I'd missed the dropping down off the track place when I reached the steep bit of track that we couldn't get up with the land Rover earlier. I was going to turn back but then remembered how steep the climb down would be so thought it might be safer going to the end of the track now that I was almost there, and then walk around the bottom of the hill back to where we left the Land Rover.
Unfortunately the plan didn't work out as I didn't find the Land Rover. Having since passed through the area in good weather I think I must have struck off from the end of the track at the wrong angle. This wouldn't have been hard to do as all I could see was whiteness. Having walked for what I thought was to far to have not arrived at the Land Rover I stopped unsure what to do next. It would have been easy to have freaked out. There didn't seem much point in going further but I couldn't think of what else to do. I considered shouting for grandfather but there didn't seem much point in that either as he was most likely at the cabin by now. I did think that if I just stayed there I should hear the Land Rover start up as I felt that it must be close by. With that in mind I attempted to walk round in a circle thinking that if it was close by I might catch a glimpse of it but I didn't see anything but white, I don't think I even managed to walk in a circle to be honest. I stopped again, took the hood from my head and listened but not only was there no sight but there was no sound either. I tried walking in another circle but in the other direction so I would have made a like a figure of eight. But as I say I couldn't tell if I was actually walking a circle so it could have ended up being any sort of a shape.
It was during this second circle that I heard running water somewhere to my left. So I turned and headed in that direction and soon dark shadows loomed out of the whiteness. They were trees along a river bank. The water looked cold and black surrounded by all the white as it was. I was excited by my find at first as I assumed that it must be the river that runs past the house from the loch. On thinking about it a while though I came to the conclusion that it couldn't be as there wasn't anything I recognised, also it seemed to be flowing in the wrong direction. So with this in mind I then thought it must be a tributary of our river. I hung around some more not wanting to cut ties with the illusive Land Rover but time passed and I heard nothing, I even shouted for help a couple of times and heard no reply. So rightly or wrongly I decided to follow the river in the hope that when it joined the river that flows past the house I would have a better idea of where I was.
No comments:
Post a Comment