RICHARD ALBROW - Loch Eil, Scottish Highlands, 2003

I attended a 6 week outdoor education course at loch Eil with 5 other enthusiastic students in 2003, we all got on really well until the 5th week when we were joined by tall rugged young man who made his youthful arrogance immediatley felt. He constantly bragged about his daring exploits in varying parts of the world which with each story all eyebrows were raised with contempt. It wasn't until the third day when we were doing an exercise in the grounds of the school when we had the last laugh, the exercise involved aiming a compass at an object ( a barrel ) and putting a black bin liner over your head and using your compass bearing to hopefully pinpoint the said barrel, all 5 of the original group managed to get within a foot or so of the objective, but Mr Outdoor man kept veering off to one side by about 20 feet, and the more he tried the worse he got, of course we chuckled respectfuly at a safe distance. Eventually he gave up in a fit of pique almost jumping up and down like spoilt child it was then one of us noticed he was wearing a heavy magnetic band on his wrist which was having dramatic effect on the compass , well we laughed so loudly it nearly brought the snow down off Ben Nevis. His pride was dented so much he mysteriously left the next day, normal service returned and we ended our extremely enjoyable course without any more distractions.