Pen Y Fan

Pen Y Fan

Bryn Posey

Our final peak yahooooooooooooooooooooooo

Darren had worked so hard on all our routes his distances where spot on his timings we managed to beat, all apart from Scarfell Pike, and us getting lost didn’t help.
Our last peak we had ran quite recently and so Darrens route card was not quite as polished as it could have been well. It was meant to be approximately a two hour run with around eight point four kilometres. As we breezed past the eight kilometre point we realised we still had about another five kilometres to go!!!!!

Our run started in the same place we set off a few months ago passing cyclists, hikers and day back packers along the way. We turned the corner that is the beginning of the climb to Pen Y Fan and it lasted for what seemed forever. At some points the trail was paved beautifully at others it was treacherous and horrendous. We summated and for once enjoyed an amazing view the first in five days, we could see for miles upon miles. Our little trot down lasted forever it was almost like the mountains wanted to keep us there and wasn’t going to let us get off. The descent off of the ridge was an ice skating session on mud which when your shins hurt, your groin hurts, your knees hurt was so painful we where laughing. I managed to do a couple of spins landing on my hand s and toes body balanced above the ground praying to not land in the quagmire of dirt and filth that was our path.

The last part passes the end of the reservoir and then follows a tarmac road for about a mile before cutting down into the car park where we knew Tim our legend third team member would be. Tim has sorted our food every day, sorted our campsites ferried us between mountains, washed our kit, helped us to the point we are under no illusions this was definitely a three man event. Big big thank you to Tim for all his help and support. As we cut in to the bottom corner of the car park, out the corner of my eye I could see two girls and a dog crouching in the long grass, my initial though was what are they up to? Then it dawned on me it was our girlfriends Gemma & Lottie. I hugged my missus and tears welled in my eyes. It was over we had finished the challenge Darren had dreamt up fourteen months ago. Wow what a feeling over one hundred and twenty two kilometres and around nine thousand meters of ascent in five days. Awesome absolutely awesome.

I would say thank you to Darren to for inviting me to join him on this challenge, but right now I ache in oh so many places. Truly this was a brilliant idea, now all we have to do is finish getting the final donations in count it up and hand it out as this was all for charity.