Well, Lynn and I had said that before the summer was over we wanted to climb the "hill" that the street we live on references - Morven (we live on Morven View). Since last week was Lynn's last week on her summer holiday, we were running out of time. Friday we woke up to fairly clear skies, so we decided that was the day to tackle Morven. Lynn packed up a picnic lunch for us and some snacks and waters, plus some winter-type gear (hat, ski gloves, buff, jacket, water-proof pants) for when we made it to the summit. Good thing Lynn knows how to prepare for a hike like this!So we set out to begin the climb from the Ballater side of the hill. Everything was going along really well for the first hour or two. I was using a walking stick and was in the lead on the trail with Lynn and Tux behind me when I got quite the shock. Right beside the trail and inches from where I stuck down my stick, I saw TWO Adder snakes, which are poisonous and basically the only dangerous thing you can run across hiking in the UK. On previous hikes I had asked Lynn about how often she has seen one - and she said she had only seen one once. So, needless to say, I was quite surprised when I ran across 2 at the same time, sunning themselves next to our trail. Nothing happened, thankfully, but I was sure nervous for the next hour or so that we hiked ... wondering if we would run across any more ... I was mostly worried about Tux, since it would be serious if he was bitten.
Once we were through the wooded areas of the climb, we could see that our trail was going to come to an end ... and the last bit of the ascent would be just climbing through heather, tall grass and bogs. Not what either of us really wanted to deal with, but we didn't have any other option if we wanted to make it to the top. Tux, on the other hand, was having the time of his life! He was romping around all over. My spirits took another dip when I stepped into a bog with my left foot and sunk in up to my knee - having my left foot soaking wet for pretty much the remainder of the hike was less than desirable. Lynn has the patience of a saint listening to me whine about the conditions of the hike! I had basically had enough when the summit was getting close - we stopped for a snack and took some photos of the terrific views - and then we started on the final climb.
When we reached the top, we found a book in a Tupperware container where fellow hikers who had come before us signed, dated and commented on their hike. We both jotted down our entries in the book. Lynn started to take a video of the view at the top when the clouds quickly started coming in - since we didn't have a trail to follow back down, Lynn thought it was best that we start our descent before things got too clouded over. We took a little different direction down in the hopes of catching a road we saw in the distance for part of the journey down. Unfortunately, the way we went ended up being more wet and boggy, but we managed OK. The trek down was less eventful. I did get a bit nervous as we approached the area where we saw the 2 Adders ... turns out there was one coiled up there at that point - I assume it was one of the 2 we had seen earlier. Tux stopped on the trail right next to it, oblivious to the fact that he was inches from a snake - we quickly called him away and thankfully he moved on with us. After being on this hike for 8 hours total, I was very happy to see our car. We are very happy we accomplished the goal of climbing Morven, but I don't think I'll be volunteering to do it again any time soon.
