I’ve been putting off writing this particular bit of the blog for such a long time. Putting what happened into words makes it concrete … makes it real. Obviously I know that it happened. I mean, it happened to me … how could I forget?! But, revisiting the scene like I’m about to do, well … it’s making my heart beat a little quicker and my hands are a little more shaky. Sometimes it’s easier to block out bad memories, isn’t it? I’m not looking forward to diving back into the deep end, back to remember a time when I felt like I was drowning …

The time was 15.34 and visibility was down to a couple of feet. I’d made the decision to stick to my original route, aiming to traverse along the Brandy Pad, back to Hare’s Gap, and then safely down to Meelmore Lodge before dark. I’d opted against climbing back the way I’d come, with the safety of the Mourne Wall, up and over the 3 peaks of Commedagh, Slievenaglogh and Corragh. I feared that I’d hike too slow on tired legs and consequently would lose light - I didn’t have my head torch with me.

In hindsight, this latter option would have had a better outcome. Yes, I would have been exhausted having to climb back up and over … but I wouldn’t have lost my way. I could have used my phone torch to guide me on my climb down from Hare’s Gap to Trassey Track. The darkness wouldn’t have been an issue - although I know for sure that I would have been petrified! Fading light in the Mournes with friends is fun. Fading light in the Mournes by yourself is frightening.

It is a brave thing to hike solo in the hills. I know this. I get messages all the time in my Instagram DMs like ‘I don’t know how you do that on your own’, and ‘you are so brave’.

Solo hiking is 100% not for everyone.

There have been many, many, many times when I haven’t felt brave in the Mournes. Like the time I froze on the steep slopes of Bearnagh while the wind whipped ferociously around me. I couldn’t take another step for fear of being blown off the side of the mountain and into the steep valley below. My legs turned to jelly and my whole body shook.

Or like another time when I solo hiked Commedagh in the snow and I had to talk myself the whole way up and down, telling myself ‘you can do this’, and, ‘you’re gonna be ok’. Every foot forward on the ice had to be carefully placed, keeping myself steady against a bitter, howling wind. It was treacherous.

Or what about that other time when I left Bloody Bridge car park in the sunshine, only to find myself ascending Donard in the snow, with only one set of footprints guiding my way. I remember telling myself I’d be ok once I got to the summit as ‘there’s always someone on Donard’. I arrived to an eerie scene at the top of NI’s highest mountain that day - not a single soul to be seen! The wind whirled around the summit like a hurricane and I wondered how on earth I was going to make it back down the mountain safely.

I made my way cautiously round to the other side of the stone hut, scaring the life out of another hiker who wasn’t expecting to see anyone else braving the elements on Donard, never mind a woman going solo in the snow! The man asked me from which direction I had ascended, and he was visibly horrified when I told him I’d come up from Bloody Bridge, meeting only one other hiker as they made their descent. Immediately the man introduced himself as Mervyn and half scolded me for being up there on my own. ‘What if you broke your leg?’ he said, whilst offering me one of his walking poles and gave me welcome company back down the other side of the mountain. ‘But what about my car?’ I wondered. Again, as if reading my mind, Mervyn offered to give me a lift from Donard car park round to Bloody Bridge - if I was happy to share a lift in his van. Without a second of doubt, I accepted his kind offer and we descended Donard together, with one pole each and plentiful conversation about hiking the entire way down.

As we cautiously descended Donard, Mervyn shared about a time whilst hiking the 7, 7s challenge when he got lost in poor conditions, meeting 3 young fellas in shorts who’d also found themselves off course and in inappropriate clothing. One of the lads was almost hypothermic when Mervyn found them on a ledge. They huddled together, shivering in the cold, one of them hardly able to string his words together legibly. I listened to Mervyn intently, still naive to the true dangers of mountain climbing as I’d not yet been in a precarious situation. ‘Yet’ is the key word there!

I was incredibly lucky to meet Mervyn that day on Donard. And after documenting the experience on my IG stories I had a few messages from people saying that Mervyn might actually have been a guardian angel. I think those people might be right. It wouldn’t be my first incident where I was protected from harm by a miracle (that’s a story for another day!)

Hopefully you are getting the picture!

Solo hiking can be a truly wonderful adventure but it is never without risk.

On a late afternoon in February 2021 I put myself at risk by wrongly assuming that I’d make it along the Brandy Pad in very poor conditions. Thankfully there was no howling wind on this day - I would have definitely opted for the safety of the Mourne Wall if there had been! I tentatively began to walk along the Brandy Pad, keeping a steady pace, always so very conscious of the tick tock of incoming darkness. I began to pray - something that I often do in the hills. At this point my biggest prayer was to meet another hiker. I knew that if I met someone in the clouds, I wouldn’t feel so alone, and they might also be able to reassure me that I was still on track.

My prayer was answered.

A little way along the Brandy Pad … sure enough … coming out of the clouds and into view was a fellow hiker. My racing heart began to slow and I let out an audible sigh of relief. Thank you Jesus. As our paths crossed we exchanged small talk about the sudden, unexpected fog and he assured me that not only was I still on route, but there were 2 female hikers not too far ahead of me, also heading for Hare’s Gap. Great news! Even though I couldn’t see them up ahead, just knowing there were other people on the Brandy Pad steadied my nerves and with a false sense of security, I continued to advance forward into the fog.

It wasn’t long before I came across a section of the route that I knew clearly belonged on the Brandy Pad. Phew. Another marker checked. I was another bit closer to Hare’s Gap.

I’m laughing now as I recall this moment. In reality, I had actually only covered such a tiny portion of the route at this point. I still had a long way to go to get all the way along this old smuggler’s route to Hare’s Gap. At the time though, every few inches forward was punctuated with a little doubt, and every minute felt long.

My little seedling of doubt grew as I began to climb the steps up to the saddle between Commedagh and Beg. Just a reminder at this point … it had been a very long time since I’d last been on the Brandy Pad. And more importantly I’d never done it solo. I couldn’t recollect whether there were steps on the Brandy Pad at all (there are) and once I’d reached the top of the steps, my little seedling of doubt had grown into a bit of a tree. And this rapidly growing tree of doubt sprouted branches when I saw a cairn coming slowly into view.

A cairn?!

Unfortunately, on that day, I didn’t know there was a cairn on the Brandy Pad, and seeing it absolutely threw me. I couldn’t make sense of it at all. From the best of my knowledge at the time, I knew cairns to exist only on the summit of a mountain. A quick google search and you will find information like this:

‘In a walking or mountaineering context they [Cairns] are used to help navigation or route-finding in poor visibility. They are frequently erected at summits or key navigational points.’

In this instance, on the saddle between Commedagh and Beg, the cairn stands as a ‘key navigational point’. And had I been on the Brandy Pad recently prior to that day, I could have been reassured by this cairn and trekked happily on past it. Except, I hadn’t been on the Brandy Pad recently prior to that day and the sight of the cairn was not reassuring at all, but confusing and frightening.

The image you see below was taken some months later when I first braved retracing my steps along this same route. The picture would have looked very different on 22nd February 2021 …

I tried to make sense of what I saw in front of me. Surely I hadn’t climbed to a summit without knowing it? Had I? I really wasn’t convinced at this point about whether I’d summited a mountain or not. My mind was whirling, my heart beating loudly in my chest.

Stay calm Steph. STAY CALM.

I can tell you sincerely … I was the furthest thing from calm right then.

In good visibility I would have clearly seen exactly where I was. That point on the Brandy Pad is still at a good height, with the summit of Slieve Beg a mere couple of hundred metres up to my left. There are 3 paths leading off from the cairn and in such poor visibility, it’s no wonder I ended up following the wrong one. On that day, in that moment, I had no notion of where I was. I saw the cairn come suddenly into view out of the fog and I panicked.

I should have stopped dead then at the cairn, I should have taken out a compass to check my bearings before moving one foot further forward. Shoulda, woulda, coulda. In my panic, I must have been walking around the cairn. This was the first wrong move. I couldn’t see two feet in front of me and very quickly I’d managed to completely disorientate myself. Which path had I come from? No idea. Which path was I supposed to take? No idea.

My most forefront thought at that point was how had I managed to summit without realising? For a moment I actually thought I was back on the summit of Slievenaglogh or Corragh. This notion is completely crazy now. I would have had to have been climbing for an awful lot longer. I could have checked my photos and seen clearly that the cairns looked different. But apparently all my sensible and rational thoughts disappeared when the panic took over.

Stupidly, I had no compass (no physical compass and in the panic I forgot about my phone app) and I also had no signal on my phone to check my google maps for my surroundings. In pure blind panic I started to walk. I think I’d convinced myself that I must have somehow summited either Corragh or Slievenaglogh and therefore, the Mourne Wall wouldn’t be far away. This idea I had is absolutely ludicrous. I wasn’t anywhere near either of those summits and was now deep in the heart of the Mournes, the Mourne Wall actually getting further away with each step! Yet the total irony was that I was searching in vain for the very same wall.

I cannot stress to you just how quickly I had become totally and completely disorientated. Right now, it seems so ridiculous but in that moment I was all panic and no logic. A few simple compass checks and I would have avoided any panic or stress. Please, please, please bring a compass or use the app on your phone when in the mountains. At the first sight of low cloud I should have whipped out a compass and used it to guide my every step.

Instead of calmly following a compass, I was rambling around the summit of Slieve Beg not knowing where the heck in the mountains I was, yet had myself convinced I was going to meet the Mourne Wall at any moment and I’d be fine. How wrong I was! After a while I did indeed come face to face with something that I recognised. I should have felt relief to see something familiar … instead I felt pure horror …