Exploring and learning while out on outdoor adventures.
When people ask how I got into winter mountaineering, the honest answer isn’t about climbing harder routes or collecting impressive grades. It was about repeated exposure, poor weather, failed objectives, and slowly learning to make decisions that kept people safe. This is the story of how that happened, traced through the Scottish mountains between 1998 …
Continue reading “How I Became a Winter Mountaineer: Ten Years of Scottish Winter Mountaineering”
The Scramble of Doom If I had to choose one surviving piece of paper to represent that whole period of my life, it might be the Warwick Mountain Walking Club poster for the Week 6 Trip – Patterdale, Lake District. At first glance, it is just another student club handout: a university logo at the …
And off we go again, another Saturday, another early start. Last weekend was spent indoors at the National Outdoor Expo; this time it was the train to Edale, leading a group out with the Austrian Alpine Club. The plan was a classic Kinder loop: up Grindsbrook Clough, across the plateau via Kinder Low and Kinder …
Continue reading “A Landscape in Motion: Grindsbrook Clough Scramble & Kinder Scout Walk”
Up early, down to the station and onto a busy train to Birmingham. There’s always that small moment of relief when you find a seat. This wasn’t a last minute decision; we’d planned to come back after enjoying it last year although this time there was a bit more intent behind it. Partly it was …
Continue reading “National Outdoor Expo 2026: Reflections on Adventure, Community and the Outdoors”
The laptop went into the locker and my bag grabbed from my locker. Then a quick walk, almost a jog, to catch the 5:15 train from Sheffield to Edale. It felt like a small escape. I’d always had 20th March in my head as the start of spring; the equinox, that clean, scientific moment when …
The journey north always carries a subtle shift in mood for me; leaving the familiar roads behind, travelling between the Lake District and the Howgill Fells, the call of the mountains gets stronger. Our first stop came just over the border at Gretna Green. For centuries this small village has been famous for one thing: …
Some places don’t just stay with you, they quietly weave themselves into your life. For me, Borrowdale is one of those valleys. One I’ve returned to across decades, through different stages of life, different friendships, different adventures. Every visit feels familiar the moment I arrive, as if the landscape itself remembers you. I’m fairly sure …
Dresden The journey began in the familiar grey of a British winter, rolling steadily south by train towards Heathrow. We spent the night at the Holiday Inn Express at Terminal 4, a surprisingly calm pocket of comfort on the edge of one of the world’s busiest transport hubs. By morning, we were travellers again, setting …
Continue reading “Walking Through Dresden, Saxon Switzerland and Berlin”
After a gentle, weather dampened day based out of Longthwaite Hostel in Borrowdale, wandering through the rain to the Bowder Stone (a glacial erratic from the last ice age), drying out in a café in Grange, pausing by the stream at the bottom of Gate Gill to soak up the atmosphere and heading up Castle …
Continue reading “Tongue Tied and Skew Gill: A Borrowdale Scrambling Day”
I was back at the New Dungeon Ghyll Hotel, we were last here on the Cumbria Way and took the chance to sneak in a quick recce of Tarn Crag Ghyll. With the dry weather it was good to get a feel for the line and confirmed that I’m still not the biggest fan of wet …
Continue reading “Evening Scrambles with the Mountain Mentor Crew. Stickle Ghyll & Tarn Crag”