It all started with a chat with Audrey Litterick and Tony Kinghorn at the Ferranti Mountaineering Club Burns supper meet at Loch Ossian hostel in January 2009. I had mentioned to them that I was approaching my 1000th Munro and was getting a bit bored with revisiting the same hills. The chat led to my being encouraged to buy Alan's wonderful book, and February was spent checking totals. I had done all the Munros, Corbetts and Donalds, plus some odds and sods, giving me 475 Marilyns at the end of 2008.
I used my main summer holiday in June to do some northern Marilyns - Beinn Ghobhlach reminded me of Brandon Mountain in Kerry. I managed to combine Ben Hope, my 999th Munro, with Meadie Ridge, which I imagine isn't often done. My 500th Marilyn was Creag nam Fiadh (16D) on a lovely June day, and I formally did Arthur's Seat trig point during the Edinburgh Seven Hills race in June.
Eric Young on the summit of Creag nam Fiadh (photo: Alan Dawson)
What Audrey and Tony hadn't warned me against was doing Marilyns after June, so I had some really horrible jungle bashes, especially on Beinn Uird (1C) and Beinn Duirinnis (3B), at the end of which my clothes and legs had been ripped to pieces by the bracken, brambles and felled forestry. However, I did have the compensation of visiting Ulva and Gometra on a trip to Mull, and I did the Graham-Munro-Marilyn combination of Beinn Fhada, Ben More and Coirc Bheinn to complete my third round of Munros.
My impression of the lower Marilyns is that they are often dire, but my accountancy mien and desire to tick off numbers, as well as visiting more nooks and crannies of Britain, especially islands, will force me onward and upward for a few more years yet.
