University walks

During this summer I have not been doing any major walks, preferring instead to wait until the weather cools off later in the month before venturing out onto mountains. I have, though, still been doing some walks locally. A couple of weeks ago I repeated the Charnwood Forest Round that I had completed last Christmas, just in better weather this time. It was just as tiring as previously and even left me aching for days afterwards which rather surprised me as although it was 24 miles there were no major hills to climb (the highest being Bardon Hill, the highest in Leicestershire at 278m), so it shouldn’t have been too difficult for me. In fact most of the walks I was doing on a Saturday afternoon were around the Charnwood area. Despite the lack of mountains it’s becoming a real favourite of mine as I hunt around for the small traces of volcanic rock that in the whole of Leicestershire exist only in that area. Last Saturday I walked from the village of Woodhouse Eaves to the Outwoods (a recently discovered gem), and from there along a permissive path into the wonderful Wood Brook valley. Climbing out of the valley through more woodland I reached the top of Beacon Hill before descending back into Woodhouse Eaves. It was a wonderful walk through quite charming surroundings, but it only lasted a couple of hours so is not really worth detailing on these pages.

Over the winter I began a short-lived series about some of my earliest walking experiences. I mentioned that while I was at University I went for a walk in Edale but I didn’t go on my own or join a walking club from the University, instead I went walking with my father. Less than two months after our first successful walk we were back again to attempt the fifth walk in the pamphlet that I’d bought (8 Walks Around Edale – probably still available from Edale Information Centre). This was a seven mile walk described as “Dramatic and extensive views from this famous ridge make the climb worthwhile.” The walk climbed the hillside along the Chapel Gate track up to the Bronze Age burial mound on Lord’s Seat. The weather was really hot so once we reached the summit I took my shirt off and learnt an important lesson: Wear Sun Cream. Even though I described the walk as “brilliant” in my diary I also note that the back of my neck was “very sore” and “my arms also look a bit red as does my shoulders and chest.” Despite catching the sun I concluded by saying “I must do it again.”

A couple of weeks later I went on holiday with some friends to the seaside near Weymouth. I didn’t really enjoy the week as what my friends liked to do didn’t really interest me, so to occupy my time while they were off elsewhere I started going for walks along the beach, first in one direction and then in the other. A couple of days later I went for another walk to the local White Horse, a pile of rocks on the hillside arranged in the shape of a white horse. The rest of my time was spent reading; it’s a pity I didn’t do more walks, or maybe actually spent some time socialising with my friends! Still, this shows that even at this time with very little walking experience behind me my inclination on holiday was to go walking.

The following year I was back in Edale with my father doing the sixth walk from my pamphlet, which is described as “A fairly strenuous ridge and valley walk with panoramic views of the Edale and Hope Valleys.” This was an 8½ mile walk along the Great Ridge to Lose Hill and down into the valley returning below the southern cloughs of Kinder Scout. My diary says “It was a very nice walk, very sunny and very pleasant. I have caught the sun just under my eyes – it’s interesting what standing in the sun can do – give you skin cancer!” I remember this as being a really enjoyable walk so it remains a mystery why this was the last walk I did with my father in Edale. Instead a couple of months later we took a train to Ribblehead in the Yorkshire Dales. I remember during an earlier visit to Ribblehead walking up to a stone air-shaft from the railway tunnel through Bleamoor. It was a bit of a climb to get to the top and I was rather proud of climbing all the way up there, but it was only 1500 feet, which is astonishing now when I think about it. I have pin-pointed this earlier visit to my last ever holiday with my parents with my diary describing the walk thus: “We went on a walk around the Yorkshire Dales near the railway line to the tunnel mouth to Bleamoor Tunnel. The scene of the viaduct was awe-inspiring.” The weather on my later visit was so poor that we didn’t get any further than the viaduct before returning to the station and catching the train back to Sheffield.

In my final year at University I didn’t do any walking at all as I was revising so much for my exams (much good it did me!). Even though my exams were over by the end of May I still never went out for a walk and instead I spent most of my time on computers (no change there!). In fact I can think of no serious walking that I did for the next four years, which really astonishes me. What was wrong with me? What was I doing instead? Not much from what I recall. Then in the autumn of 1997 I went on a residential in North Wales as part of a Supervisory Management course (again that didn’t really help me). A large part of the weekend was spent in team-building exercises and one of the tasks was to be driven somewhere and be expected to find our way back to the centre. As we were given a map and directions this was easy and I found myself actually leading the team for this exercise as I had already shown good map-reading skills (where I got them from I don’t know – I was never in the Scouts!). I remember during the course of the walk gazing at the night’s sky and the brilliant North Wales scenery and thinking I was loving this. I described the evening like this in my diary:

“After a truly gruesome dinner, we split up into our teams and my team was taken to Croesor. We were given a map and directions and told to find our way back to Aberglaslyn. So with me holding the map (the leader!) we walked back. This was very enjoyable (sic) and we all had a very good time; most of the team commented that the walk was one of the highlights of the weekend, but wished it was more difficult with less road walking. I enjoyed it immensely and made me wish I did more country walking.” Why hadn’t I already been going walking? I couldn’t answer this question but I knew then what I would be doing the following the summer, and I have been doing it ever since.

The Red Cuillin Hills

Friday 4th July 2008

For the last walk on my holiday I caught a bus to the popular climber's haunt, Sligachan Inn, at the northern end of the great Cuillin range with the mighty Sgurr na Gillean dominating the landscape. I had considered going up the eye-catching mountain, but a wet start and my own reluctance to fall from a great height to my death, I mean to climb such a difficult and exposed mountain, redirected my attention elsewhere. Instead I went up the hills nearby that, despite sharing a similar name to the Cuillin, are very different in character. The Red Cuillin are rounded hills with smooth grassy slopes low down and above 300m have an abundance of loose rock strewn about their steep hillsides. They are not rugged or challenging, they have no jagged angles or sheer cliffs and they are not even very high, but the views from them are amazing. I started along a path that follows the shallow ravines of Allt Daraich and then veered off towards Sron a’Bhealain across a boggy plain. Once the bog was thankfully left behind I climbed the hill to the top of Sron a’Bhealain, and along the ridge beyond. With the boring bit over I began to climb the steep scree slopes of Beinn Dearg Mheadonach (Middle Red Mountain), with similar climbs being required on all of these hills. When I reached the top I walked around the edge of the corrie, over the actual summit and on to the end of the ridge. The views towards the neighbouring hills from this vantage point and even across the sea to Scalpay were sensational. The early rain had cleared to leave me with great weather for the rest of the day, and was giving me good views everywhere even though the biggest hills, including all of the Cuillin remained hidden beneath clouds for much of the day. It was rather satisfying to be on top of the Red Cuillin with clear views while Blaven and the Cuillin were wrapped around in cloud, so maybe I had made the right choice. Returning to the main corrie edge I descended to Bealach Mosgaraidh and climbed the higher Beinn Dearg Mhor (Big Red Mountain – spot a running theme in these names?). It took me a long time to climb up the scree but eventually I reached the summit where I had my lunch in the excellent weather with superb views all around me. After lunch I descended the interminable scree to Bealach na Sgairde, sliding down on occasions rather than walking due to the steepness of the scree. This was a difficult descent but that was nothing compared to the ascent that was ahead of me up Glamaig.

With no path to follow I struggled up the steep scree and I seemed to be taking forever, feeling like I'd never reach the top. However, when I was almost at the summit I turned away and traversed the eastern ridge of Glamaig to its end, An Coilleach, where I had great views out to sea and towards the mainland, before returning along the ridge to complete my ascent of the summit. Now began a descent that will forever be remembered for its frenetic haste and steepness as, with terrifying speed on the steep scree, I slid down the slope often using my hands to keep upright. How I never came to a sorry end I’ll never know, and even once the scree was over I still had long grass slopes to descend before eventually I reached the boggy floor. That descent seemed to just keep going down and down, never ending as I had thought I would reach the bottom once I’d cleared the scree. Once finally at the bottom a wet walk beside the river brought me back to Sligachan where, while I was still some distance away, I saw the bus that I had half-hoped I would catch, was leaving the Inn. Catching that bus had been a weak excuse to come hurtling down a steep slope but it was tremendous fun nonetheless and the walk turned out to be epic, though before starting I had expected it to be short and easy. The scree slopes, particularly on Glamaig, proved to be really strenuous and time consuming. A combination of those scree slopes and the heat really drained me of energy, but fortunately this was the last walk of my holiday so I was be able to go back to work the following week and recover from my holiday!