Ben Nevis

I hadn't been planning to do this. I had been planning on cycling in Belgium, France and England, but then Lorraine became ill and I had to cancel that trip at the last minute. Suddenly flush with time, the notion began to develop in my mind that I should stair-climb another mountain. I noted that the royal wedding was slated for early last Friday morning and I further noted that Ben Nevis, Britain's highest peak, is 1328 meters from the start of the trail to the summit, which is a handy 246 circuits of my stairs. So there I was, early on Friday morning, with the sounds of the royal wedding in the background as I began to ascend the 6642 steps (and at the same time descend 6642 steps of course). This proved to be rather arduous and took the better part of four hours, in part because I went slowly at first to avoid making too much noise as everyone was still sleeping and in part because I looked in on the wedding from time to time.

When I tell people what I've been doing they look at me as if I've just declared my intention to become a competitive marathon pencil-sharpener. And this is the beauty of this project. The attraction is entirely personal. There are no bragging rights, there is no admiration, there is no fresh air, there are no spectacular views and there are no great stories to tell afterwards. There is consequently a kind of purity of endeavor about this that is appealing. Or at least this is what I tell myself... ;-)