It had been a lovely walk despite a few hail showers. The weather had even cleared just before sunset, letting me enjoy the beautiful views from Tawny Rower and over Lugacolliwee Lough, with Croagh Patrick and the Atlantic coastline in the distance. But sometimes things just don't go as planned. With about 45 minutes left for the descent before dark, timing was perfect, until I realised, about 700m after leaving Tievnabinnia E Top, that my phone had fallen off one of my jacket's pockets. Panic on board. With another two weeks or so to spend in Ireland (I am French and live in France) and only my tablet as a means of communication, I had no other choice but retrace my steps to try and find the lost item. I knew I had taken a selfie at the summit so followed my GPS track back to there, hoping the phone hadn't fallen into the only marshy bit I had crossed.
The headtorch soon came into use as the night was falling, but after two out and back trips to the summit, running out of forces and with only one set of batteries left to light my way, I had to give up and retreat back to the car pissed off, albeit with the firm intention to be back up there the next day. The phone being all the more waterproof, I was hoping to find it "alive".
The next day, I once again followed my GPS track back to the summit area and soon found it. Much easier in the daylight, of course. The phone still had some battery on and I headed back to the summit for another, victorious selfie (lol). This track recounts the first day's adventure, a walk which was supposed to take about half the time shown above (I didn't record the second trip as I didn't want to have another track overlapping the four others during the search). The correct stats are probably around 12km distance and about 670m total ascent.