Three Peaks Challenge Avis 

We booked on to this challenge - National 3 peaks in 24 hours. We paid £369 just for the guides and transfers between peaks. Cost to get to Fort William at 7 am on start day ( so hotel stay previous night) , food , and travel back from Chester to your home not included.

The company are happy to book you on, irrespective of what you say regarding your fitness level. A few of us categorically specified we were not marathon fit. So when the unsuspecting person i.e you meet the guides you get a talk - first time you are told you have to be marathon fit to attempt this, you have to keep to times or you will be sent back down as failures etc etc. The reality of this speech hits you when you start your first challenge. The fit participants surely race ahead - at a super pace - not normal hiking pace . Ben Nevis requires 8 hours + of strenous climbing on a good day. They give you 5 ( even on a bad day). Right at the start these experienced guides keep discouraging you and saying you are not going to summit - as early as the first 5 minutes - you start feeling terrible about yourself. They carry on attacking your mind and shout at you for wiping your nose or having a polite conversation with a fellow participant or even stopping to take your water bottle out .. leave alone stopping to catch your breath ... In the next 10 - 25 minutes they declare you unfit and tell you to head back down .. so you head back in shame .. This story continues for all the other peaks! You never summit any peak as you simply are not marathon fit. This company should really be putting up a warning on the booking website .. or later when you fill up your fitness questionnaire .. They lie to you and even tell you they will put you in groups of matching fitness . Truth is they dont care, they just want your money.

Out of the 42 or so who were on the buses, 20 or so must have made up and down the 3 peaks. A few who were made to quit actually got off and took a train or went out to hire a car and didnt bother coming back to the buses. 6 were injured Ben Nevis, trying to rush the challenge at crazy speeds , 2 had to be dropped off at A&E. Most of the 20 who dropped out did not even bother to get to the second peak or third...

The weather was rubbish , rocks were slippery , another climber ( not from this group) faced a bad head injury.

So buyer beware, only book on to the 24hour challenge if you are marathon fit and can run up and down hills! You are better off making good use of the money elsewhere or taking your time and doing the peaks at your own pace.

The guides are brilliant and work for various companies, they claim they do not get to know who has booked on till they arrive on the day ... Its the company which keeps this quiet and leaves it to you to do the math and the research! I bet the 20 of us who did not summit would have never signed on had we known!!!