Back in 2005, I devised a dubious plan to erect a pop-up bar on top of the highest peak in the UK in the middle of winter with an unlikely band of miscreants and a dozen bottles of Italian liqueur.

[image: Miscreants – Left to right: sister, barman, me, doorman and a camper that cost us a lot of money]

Looking back now I can still remember selling the idea in a drive to raise aid for a charity appeal but I’m sure my undiagnosed ADD might also have had something to do with it. Thanks to some hard selling and cheap sponsors, I had my resident bar cover our base expenses and a then obscure Tuscan liqueur called Tuaca, contributing some liquid courage alongside a pledge for press and a sizable donation upon returning alive.

And so it was, in the spirit of the great British adventurers before me, names like Shackleton, Lawrence of Arabia and Bilbo Baggins, I found myself crammed into the back of a dodgy rent-a-dent camper from Crawley with a bartender, a doorman, my sister and our twelve liquid Italians.

With four days allowance to select our perfect window of ascent, we decided to see a bit of the land first and take in the wild Scottish west coast. One hour into the Highlands we’d listened to all we could take of our only CD – Now That’s What I Call Music 61 – and tuned into the local radio network and a thickly accented announcement of an approaching system humbly described as “the worst storm to hit Scotland for decades”. So naturally, we ignored it.

[image: Met Office isobar map of the January, 2005 storm centered right over Scotland.]

Amid traveler warnings to not be out in your car, we emerged from the relative shelter of the treeless highland craigs, onto the exposed wild Hebrides coast and the biggest waves I’ve ever seen. By this time, those of us not driving were distributing our weight in the back of the camper like a boat being hit by squalls while diving into the obscure Italian liqueur like it was the last hour before prohibition.

Turning at the nearest bay we beat a hasty retreat back into the relative protection of the highlands by which time we were fighting a maelstrom of flying debris in a vehicle with more in common to a yacht then a van. By the time we finally arrived at our initial base camp destination of Fort William, we’d polished off two bottles of liquor, hit a flying tree (and something that looked like a sheep), lost our front license plate and indicator light, had a roof vent sucked out and broken all of the mugs in the kitchenette from the battering received by the wind. What can I say, Scotland in winter…we had arrived!

[image: Northwest face of Ben Nevis – c/o Wiki Commons]

With a population of around 20,000, Fort William is the second largest settlement in the Scottish highlands and closest community centre to the UK’s highest peak, Ben Nevis. Topping at only 1,344 metres (4,409 ft) what “The Ben” lacks in height is well made up for in exposure. Hitting every major weather system to come out of the North Atlantic, the summit sees an average of only 60 days of sunlight a year. Luckily for us, along with easy access to the Ben Nevis trail, Fort William also offered the best haggis and whisky cream sauce pies in the world (Volunteer Arms), had some of the cutest cows I’d ever seen – don’t judge me – and ingeniously hosts a Scotch distillery inside it’s visitor information center. So we headed their first for a weather update and the number for mountain rescue – just to be safe.

First thing we learnt is that there is a rich history of idiots just like us who have scaled Ben Nevis with all manner of props and equipment. A Model T Ford (twice), a pipe organ, an entire bedroom, in a wheelchair, on a unicycle, even a pole dancer performed on the summit. Luckily for us, lady fortune offering an eight hour break in the weather scheduled for the next day from which would be our only opportunity to attempt the peak in over a week. So we rested, organised our final supplies and sundries, packed our liqueur and had an early night dreaming of mountaineering pole-dancers and cute highland cows – don’t judge me.

[image: Below the snow line, halfway point – stunning views]

On a crisp clear Scottish morning (i.e. cloudy with drizzle) we began our ascent with a fully kitted pop-up bar, sponsorship banners, charged hip flasks and knee-high socks. Two hours in we had hit our stride, emptied our hippies and taken in some of the most stunning views of highlands imaginable. There truly is nowhere in the world like it.

A further two hours on, we had reached the snow line and the final beat to the ridge…when everything changed. Like a glass ceiling separating this world from that of the mystics, in the space of 20 meters we entered a dense white fog layer in perfect blending with the equally dense and white snow covered scree on which we walked. The pace slowed, wind rose, temperature plummeted and time stopped. We took it slow but didn’t stop knowing we had a small window of light with which to return. Finally, with faces, fingers and attitudes getting colder by the minute the ground leveled and the emergency shelter (nothing more than a steel box atop a stone step) came into view. We’d reached the top, tired, wet and cold but we’d taken the right kit and hit our daylight window perfectly. With fog obscuring any chance of a view and the steel box offering the only shelter for miles, we sardined ourselves inside and made our first mistake, took our gloves off.

Doing our best to keep warm in an impossible environment I opened another bottle of Tuaca to grunts of praise and rapture. In a steel box with one midget door, no windows, seats or ability to stand up, there still remained in true British fashion, a guest book. One we signed, dated and marked accordingly by leaving a fresh bottle of Italian goodness for the next would be adventurers.

The money shot – [insert gale force winds]

With gale force winds, limited visibility, limited use of our fingers and laughing at the shear stupidity of it all, we erected what we could of the bar, took a photo and hastily beat a retreat back down the mountain to the safety of a pub, a fire and more haggis pie. By the time we’d successfully returned to level footing we’d only seen two other people all day, a local Scotsman and his son who in our descent, were making their way their way up the trail in fading light like it was any given Sunday.

The next day, in celebration of our safe return and last bottle of Tuaca, we hit the local Ben Nevis Scotch distillery for a sample of the good stuff and a taste of victory. While their whisky may not be as well known as others that begin with the word ‘Glen’, it is one of the oldest licensed distilleries in Scotland and one of the most humble and personable distillery experiences I’ve ever had. It was here, while sharing a wee dram with one of their Master Distillers and regaling our tale of adventure that we learned a final twist to our story.

[image: Scottish Cows and Italian Liqueurs]

Living next to the local mountain rescue centre, our friendly local distiller is awoken every time the siren is announced in an emergency call. At what would have been well past midnight, a chopper returned with what he later learned to be a father and son team who were rescued from the summit emergency shelter after loosing daylight in ever worsening weather. Knowing first hand that all that existed inside that lonely steel fridge atop Ben Nevis was a guest book and bottle of Tuaca Italian liqueur for company, we took immediate responsibility for the gift of liquid hope in a family’s darkest hour. For that story, we donated our final bottle of liqueur to the distiller.

In retrospect some nine years later, it was not the bravery of four ignorant adventurers, the incredible hospitality of the Scots, their attractive bovine (don’t judge me) or the loss of deposit placed on a robust little campervan, but rather 12 bottles of Tuscan liqueur which inspired a story, fueled a road trip, installed courage and warmed a memory I’ll not soon forget as long as I live.

This was the Musings of a Barfly by:

Rusty Hawthorn

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