For those of you who have never ventured onto one of these meets the weekend starts as usual by meeting on Friday evening at T.Y.W. Saturday will as usual be spent walking, climbing, biking, or avoiding the rain. In the evening while the BBQs are being lit and the steaks, sausages and anything else that comes to mind are being blackened on the outside the participants of this eagerly awaited repast will be destroying their brain cells on alcoholic beverages. The evening will pass in convivial conversation, food and more drink before everyone eventually drifts off to bed. Sunday will take care of itself.
A nominal charge of around £5 per head is levied by the meet leader to defray the expenses incurred by members providing additional food [beyond that which all members usually provide] and also to myself who will provide some of the alcohol. I shall provide a number of disposable BBQs for everyone to use but I would be grateful if some members could provide their own.
Not the official meet more like Hayes and Lancaster holiday tours, but just in case any one is at a loose end and wants to join in the fun I thought I would let you know of our plans this summer.
We are heading for the South side of Monte Rosa and Lyskamm so lots of snowy peaks to keep us busy. It's my first time to the area so I have no idea what to expect but Rob tells me the valley looked nice when he walked across the top of it last year and the camping website looks good as well.
If you want to join us then just book yourself into the campsite under your own name. I have booked the weather but you will need to do the rest!
Camping Alagna (South side of Monte Rosa) e.mail - info@campeggioalagna.it website - http://www.campeggioalagna.it/ telephone - 0039 0163 922947 See you in Italy. Michael Hayes
Only one space left. If you are interested just contact Pam
A group of ten Oreads attended the working party and I am pleased to report that all planned jobs were carried out.
Work started Friday afternoon with Chuck and John Fisher doing grass and hedge cutting and the removal of the pile of ashes near the coal bunker. John Dobson (a real hard worker) carried out preparatory work for painting around the bay window.
Saturday saw some of the driest conditions ever experienced at the Hut. A burst water main in the village meant that we were without water from 8.00a.m. until 22.00 p.m. Tim, resourceful as ever, drove to Beddgellert to obtain drinking water, while others fetched water from the stream by the station.
However, work carried on regardless. Nick Evans and apprentice "Don't tell them your name" - fitted a loft ladder. Chris Jonson and Tim Cairn removed all the old sealer from around the shower cubicles and hand wash basins and resealed the lot. C. Hobday laid tiles in front of the lounge fire and the carpet was then cut to fit up to the tiles.
Chuck Hooley painted the floor in the utility room and fitted two new toilet seats. He also gave the outside bench a fresh coat of wood preserve while Ernie Phillips installed a new toaster and sharpened the kitchen knives. John Dobson completed the painting and so ended a successful weekend. Many thanks to all who attended.
WILL MEMBERS WHO HAVE USED THE HUTS OVER THE PAST FEW MONTHS AND HAVE NOT PAID THEIR HUT FEES PLEASE PAY A.S.A.P. THANK YOU, Colin Hobday.
Fool's Paradise on Gowder Crag in Borrowdale is in a dangerous condition. More details: http://www.ukclimbing.com/forums/t.php?t=134885
Everyone knows Longstone Edge, by sight if not by name, because it is the very heart of our National Park - in between Calver, Hassop, Monsal Head and Wardlow. Its what you look at from the Eastern Edges. But if you don't do something now to save it, you won't see it any more. You won't see it any more because Mr Harpley of Bleaklow Industries, who lives in Lancashire, is digging it up, with the help of Mekriman Ud of Thurmaston, Leicester, and taking it away in lorries to sell for aggregate. And if the fight to save it is lost, he will continue to do so, with all the mechanistic might of modern machinery, until the year 2042.
This is your problem, and not someone else's. You have to do something about it. Sympathetic apathy is not enough. I shall explain a little of a complex situation, and then spell out how you can help.We are in the obscure world of mineral planning applications, and the meaning of a single sentence. You know what a limestone quarry looks like, because you have' seen them often enough. They are about the blasting and crushing of huge expanses of host rock, typically across a face. You probably know too what a vein mineral is: it's a mineral deposit that occurs in a vein. The process for extracting it is by mining - digging the veins out by either open cast or underground method. A quarry typically leaves an exposed face in perpetuity; a vein mineral site typically leaves a backfilled site that approximates to the natural contour of the land.
You can see examples of both on Longstone Edge. At the eastern end, above the Calver to Hassop road, a huge quarry called Backdate is rapidly extending its scar across the protected landscape of the National Park, forever. Along the middle of the top of the Edge, to the north of the unmetalled road, there is a long geological fault, or rake, which contains, in veins, minerals like galena, barytes, fluorspar and calcite. Different stretches of the rake have their own names, like High, Deep, Bow and Arthurton. These are being worked/mined, or have already been backfilled by a local company called Glebe Mines. Neither the BMC nor the Save Longstone Edge Group has any issue at this time with Glebe Mines and their vein mineral extraction business. We have in the past, and we have come now to reasonable accommodation with a reasonable and socially aware, socially responsible company.
The problem is that Harpley and Merriman claim their current quarrying activity is permitted under planning permission granted in 1952 which is for"the winning and working of fluorspar and barytes and for the working of lead and any other minerals won in the course of working those minerals". They claim limestone is "any other mineral" and that unlimited quantities of it can be removed under the permission. If the vein you are working is say, two meters wide, you may need to take out half a meter, or even a little more, each side to get at it. Harpley is using the above wording to justify extraction of, it is believed, about 70 parts of limestone to 1 part of vein mineral. And the vein mineral, where it is separated at all, is, it is believed, being stacked on site and not processed at all.The Peak District National Park Planning Authority issued an enforcement notice on Merriman and Bleaklow to cease their activity. They have appealed against this notice, and are entitled to continue their operation until this appeal is determined, by a Planning Inspector, at a Public Enquiry. Since this is a legal affair, the focus of the Public Enquiry will be to determine what is meant by the single sentence quoted above, in bold type. Anything else will be outside its scope, so any argument must be contextualised on that sentence:
The Peak District National Park Planning Authority issued an enforcement notice on Merriman and Bleaklow to cease their activity. They have appealed against this notice, and are entitled to continue their operation until this appeal is determined, by a Planning Inspector, at a Public Enquiry. Since this is a legal affair, the focus of the Public Enquiry will be to determine what is meant by the single sentence quoted above, in bold type. Anything else will be outside its scope, so any argument must be contextualised on that sentence:
The issue for the BMC, and many others, is the destruction of the landscape of the National Park, its flora, its fauna and its panoramas for ever. Do we say "Oh, never mind, too much trouble"? Or do we say "No way." Members of the Peak Area Committee have indicated time and again that they want the BMC to take a stand and it has. The Chief Officer has written to the Planning Officer - on interpretation of the critical sentence - and we will therefore be represented at the Public Enquiry.
1952 Authority which will have wider implications within this and every other National Park and Area of Outstanding National Beauty. You will find quarries springing up all over the place, and you will not be able to stop them, and they will go on growing until 2042. Do you do something now, or blame yourself for inaction when it's too late?
There are three things you can do:
- you can tell everyone you know about it, and ask them for support
- you can join the Save Longstone Edge Group, which costs nothing because the people who do the work are volunteers, by sending them a donation for the legal battle: they will be major witnesses to the Enquiry. At the moment they have only between £3000 to £4000 in the kitty, and that does not go far if you have legal expenses to meet, and barristers to pay. The contact details are:
Save Longstone Edge (and thats what you write on your cheque) 1 Old Hall Gardens Stoney Middleton Hope Valley S32 4TZ
or
www.longstone-edge.org.uk
- you can attend the Public Enquiry to show solidarity. You do not have to say anything, though if anyone asks why you have come you can say it is because you care about 'the preservation of your, and your children's national heritage.' Your presence will help. We do not know the date yet, except that it will likely be between July and November this year, but we will let you know. H L F Folkard 14 April 2005Stung by accusations of decadence a club committee decided that a demonstration of prowess and vigour was called for and embarked on a series of classic ascents. They used a variety of quaint equipment with half and full weight hawsers, 9, 11 and 12 mm perlon ropes and they attempted Ivy Chimney, Vector, Sloth, Tennis Shoe and Pinnacle Wall. The climbers, Appe, Adhoyb, Rewn, Dusho [shouldn't that be Dunsho? - ed.] and Sheay met different fates. One completed the route in triumph, skipping nimbly across the long leftwards traverse, one fell and cracked his ribs, one was so over-faced by Sloth that he retired in disgrace, one completed the hardest part of his route with ease and traversed on to the main slab from the left, but was then so confused by the amber liquid previously imbibed that he wandered aimlessly about on the easy angled slab until rescued. One approached Ivy Chimney in so leisurely a fashion that he was benighted. Adhoyb [lot of typos here Rusty: shouldn't this read "Ah… body!" - ed.] had a different style of rope from Sheay who had colleagues with both thicker and thinner ropes. Both climbers with hawsers visited their injured colleague in hospital. The injured man on a 9mm perlon rope was visited by the hero (half wt. hawser). Rewn used a thinner rope than Dusho who attempted the shortest route. The climber on full wt. (not Dusho or Adhoyb) was benighted in Ivy Chimney. An 11mm rope was used on Tennis Shoe.
Free range eggs to first solver to list climber, rope, route and result.
[I'm not getting any entries for these excellent puzzles. I shall discontinue next month unless I get some protests that you love solving them but aren't that keen on eggs! - ed.]