Dr Pippa Baker our lead consultant has taken on the Three Peaks challenge along with her husband Scott, her two girls (12,13) and dog Meg.
The Baker family were looking for a ‘staycation’ at the end of the summer holidays and wanted to do something active with an aim and purpose. Pippa had never been to Snowdonia and explored the idea of climbing Snowdon and turning it into a road trip, the idea later evolving into their very own Baker family Three Peaks Challenge, climbing Snowdon, Scafell Pike and Ben Nevis. Pippa decided that in celebration of the Hospice’s 40 year birthday, she would raise sponsorship through the event.
The challenge took the Bakers five days to complete, they wanted to start with Snowdon and make their way up the country. They left on Tuesday morning and upon reaching Snowdonia took the decision to crack on and go straight for climb number one. The climb took them just under 5 hours and they completed it will very little trouble. After a day resting, the family were back on it and on Thursday headed for the Lake District to take on climb number two, Scafell Pike. The Bakers found this to be the easiest of the climbs but explained that there was no shade which made for tougher walking conditions.
Determined to press on, the family left for Fort William the very next day and took on their third and final climb on Saturday, Ben Nevis. They were feeling pretty smug when ascending Ben Nevis after meeting up with many individuals who were only on climb one of their Three Peak Challenge, practically seasoned climbers at this point they made their way to the summit. Pippa explained how she was in shock at how bitterly cold it was at the top, a reflection on just how high they had gone. She jokingly said she was told by others that had made the trip to bring a hat and gloves but laughed it off being summer. Unfortunately, the family were met with clouds at the summit but were not disappointed due to the spectacular scenery they had encountered on their trek up. Ben Nevis took around 6 and a half hours to climb.
The family are keen walkers and Pippa in her youth was made to walk the Alps each year by her dad, she thought what better way to get her own back than to make her family take on a trek. She later found this plan would backfire when the girls took the challenge in their stride, often waiting for mum to catch up. Poor Scott played packhorse carrying the bags. Dog Meg had a whale of a time! The family even brought Meg a special doggy rucksack in case she struggled (quite the challenge for a lab) but fortunately for Scott it wasn’t needed.
Pippa said the whole family did exceptionally well with minimal moaning, in fact, she was the biggest moaner of them all and explained that during the challenge how much she was thankful for her Amazon Prime account, ordering a multitude of items to relieve her ailments such as a knee brace. In her words “we would turn up at our accommodation, they would hand me the keys along with my Amazon parcel”. We are told Pippa’s knees thankfully have since recovered from the experience.
We would like to offer a huge congratulations to the Baker family for completing this challenge and thank them for their kind support.
There is still time to donate to the Baker’s challenge and you can do so by clicking here.
