One day in 1890, world reknowned British chemist and mountaineer J. Norman Collie climbed the 2nd highest peak in the British Isles, Ben MacDhui. Near the summit, he experienced a terrible feeling of panic, as he was convinced that he was hearing someone walking behind him, though he had come up the summit alone -- and the sound of these footsteps in the snow were as if a creature some two or three times his size were following close behind him. He descended from the top as fast as he could, but couldn't get a good look at what was behind him because of a heavy grey mist.
Or so Collie recounted to a group of Mountaineers some 35 years later. Others have also reported feelings of panic, and a sense of being chased by a giant grey man, when they approached the peak of Ben MacDhui. So began the legend of Am Fear Liath Mòr, or The Big Grey Man of Ben Macdhui.
One scientific explanation for this phemenon is that the climbers are experiencing a sense of being overwhelmed by the enormity of nature, next to which they feel their own isolation and mortality, a feeling enhanced by their exhaustion. Also that the climbers may have seen a Brocken Spectre, which is an optical illusion whereby someone looking into mist sees a magnified version of their own shadow, which they mistook for a giant creature.
The photo is of the Cairn at the peak of Ben MacDhui, taken by Oliver Mills.
