On A Roll Again

After a few very frustrating weeks the parts we had been waiting for had arrived and work could finally resume.
As you may know, Fort William is a pretty damp place, but persistent rain wasn't going to stop Mike getting the van fixed. I came home from college one day to find him at work in the kitchen, obviously not cooking, but surrounded by various bits of van and a lot of tools.

As soon as the rain stopped the parts went on the van, however the nice smooth start up and test drive didn't quite go to plan. After weeks of sitting stationary in cold weather, all three of the batteries had died, and two days of trying to recharge them in our flat was unsuccessful. Luckily, Connors dad, Simon, arrived in town. Excellent! We can use his car to jump start the van. No. No we can't. We were yet again stopped in our tracks, this time by some interesting wiring going on around the batteries. By the time it was sorted Simon had disappeared into town, so it was down to our last option - bump start. And bump starting a two tonne van is actually easier than you may think! We were finally running and after a little drive around Fort William to charge the batteries a bit it was time to get off the roads.
Simon had driven up from Yorkshire to get in a few days climbing with Connor. The next day Mike, Simon, Connor, and our other flat mate, Will, were planning on heading up to Ben Nevis, and since we had a key for the guide car park we all decided it would only be right to head up and see how the north face was looking. What we all failed to notice until we reached the guide car park was the cloud base down at about 300m. No chance of seeing the north face from the car park but it was a fun drive and great to get the van back on - and off - the road.