Yesterday marked the longest I have ever been outside the US and away from my family: 90 days. I'll be going back for Christmas in exactly four weeks, which feels unreal.
After a lot of agonizing, I backed out on the hillwalking trip to Killin. I asked about the routes at the sign-up earlier this week, and each one looks to encompass two Munros in 6-8 hours, a timetable which MUST be adhered to because of the limited daylight hours this time of year. (Incidentally, sunset in Edinburgh today: 3:59pm). Considering that Ben Vane alone took me somewhere between eight and nine hours back in September, I am not at all confident in my abilities to summit two Munros in that amount of time. And failure to meet that challenge would mean me, and probably several other people, getting stranded on a mountainside after dark in the southern highlands of Scotland in November. They did say that if the weather was terrible, the walks would probably be shortened to one Munro each, or maybe even just a hike around Loch Tay; so I've been hoping for terrible weather all week, but tomorrow's forecast is light rain (par for the course in that part of the country, in other words). I'm trying to repeat to myself that it's not chickening out, it's simply being aware of my capabilities and limits...but I'm still a bit disappointed not to be going.
In other news, I took a basic first-aid course today (through the hillwalking club, as it happens). It covered the recovery position, CPR, abdominal thrusts, and a quick overview of what to do for shock, heat exhaustion, heat stroke, and hypothermia. I remembered a lot of it from a course I took through the Red Cross when I was about 12, for babysitting purposes.
Oy. About every month, I experience an overwhelming need to get the hell out of Edinburgh for a while. The result of that last month was my trip to Tiree, and the month before that I was just getting back from a trip around the highlands and islands. I was planning to climb Arthur's Seat tomorrow to make up for not going to Killin, but I think I might hop a train to Stirling instead...
Cheers, y'all.
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