TGO 2023 or Pieman's 19th Nervous Breakdown

 

Mallaig to Inverie Ferry

It's now the end of August 2024 (if it isn't, please don't point this out in comments because I won't publish them.) Anyway, Autumn is the time when many people's thoughts turn to whether or not they should "do" the TGO challenge next year and this account may well put a few off the idea altogether. It's mainly pictures anyway, which "Blogger" is determined to do daft stuff with - e.g. put them in the wrong order, say that the format isn't supported by blogger (they're all the same format) and/or make them disappear altogether.  This is harder than "doing" the TGO challenge, so if I can complete this blog post without turning to drink or calling for a mental health nurse, I could well be successful in the 2025 TGO challenge. This would be significant due to it being my 20th TGOC. It's all in the mind, y'know.

No idea who this is. Whoever he is is on the first bealach of Day 1

Camp near Sourlies

In May 2024, I started at Mallaig, ferried across to Knoydart  and walked over to Loch Arkaig. then to Fort William, through Glen Nevis to Corrour, then through an empty bit to the A9 and Glen Tilt. Braemar, Glen Clova, Kirriemuir, Forfar (five) and Arbroath. I'm not going to write a day-by-day account. Everybody else does that and I tend to lose the plot as to whatever day it's supposed to be. I'll probably just point out the good bits, the really good bits and the bits I won't ever do again. And if Blogger will allow, there will be a bunch of pictures in the right order.

Oh yes, and I won't be doing anything at all about gear. Don't talk to me about gear, I can't help rolling my eyes during discussions about gear. Evangelism has it's place in churches or on mad TV channels but I'm not interested if I'm in the wrong boots, or the incorrect tent or my rucksack is out of fashion.

Walked with this chap for a day. No idea who he was

An American at Meanach bothy

.... seem to have come a long way....

The start was superb. I got the 10:30 ferry from Mallaig to Inverie on a sparklingly beautiful, sunny summer morning. The anti.............cipation was buzzing on the boat. This was probably the best beginning to a TGO challenge I've ever had. The walk into the mountains was fantastic but my pack was far too heavy. Due to the impossibility of re-supply after Fort William, I had planned a five day section through the middle of all middleness, so I had a large amount of food. I also had a fair amount of whisky and cooking gas. This made the first heave up the first bealach a bit of a struggle. The struggle on hills continued to Fort William, where I got lost during a thunderstorm, having also developed a blister on the miles and miles of Caledonian Canal towpath (which is really boring by the way - my advice is not to go that way).

That's Ben Alder over there

Nice, breezu, sunney afternoon

Skippy's tent

I shopped a bit at Aldi a heaved myself up Glen Nevis and the path through to Corrour, being met by some American challengers who called me "Sir". Only policemen usually call me "Sir", so it was a bit unnerving. It seems that the TGOC is becoming quite popular with Americans due to one of them writing an article I think in the New York Times (I'm probably wrong about this.) Anyway - we all stayed the night in Meanach bothy and continued sort of separately but together, meeting some more Americans the next morning. My last proper scoff till Braemar was at the cafe on Corrour station. I pressed on East, being accompanied for a while by a veteran TGO challenger from Rotherham. The weather turned drizzly and windy and the clouds descended on nearby hills. I camped that windy night beside a small fishing loch somewhere in the middle of nowt much else.

Camp on the shielings Glen Tilt

An evening at Lochcallater Lodge

Somebody following me up Jock's Road

During the next five days I ate five days food and started moving significantly quicker up the hills. I was always a couple of kilometres short of where I should be each evening when my ageing frame gave up and I had to put up the tabernacle and go to bed. As it happened, I was using a Spot 4 device, so despite the lack of phone signals, everybody who ought to know, knew where I was, so nobody got worried. I did some high bits, met hares, deer and ptarmigan, but no actual people at all. I did pass a tent which I called to but got no response. In the evening of Day 4 out of the 5, I came across the tent again, and it was occupied by another veteran challenger. Its nice to chat to old friends in strange and remote places. This happens from time to time.

Then I was in the fleshpots of Braemar, with fish and chips, showers, beer and a noisy night in the boozer, followed by a proper breakfast, a short walk to Callater and a fun whisky and guitar night at Lochcallater Lodge. This was so much fun, I'll be putting it on my 2025 route.

And then it was Jock's road, Glen Clova, being vaguely told by the staff at Clova Hotel that they might not have any accommodation for me. So I camped by the river and plodded over the hills to Kirriemuir the next day where I had a bed booked at the Thrums Hotel - so more washing, charging up electronics and stuffing my face with calories. Later there was a Yellow weather warning for high winds and rain, resulting in a route rethink. Somewhere more sheltered and above-all, shorter.

Memorial shelter on Jock's road

Descent into Glen Doll/Glen Clova

Some kind of big dog with sticks on its head

I rang control and told them where I was going. Where I was going, was Forfar (five) (apols, done that joke already). In Forfar, there was a Greggs which provided a butty and coffee lunch. Thence to Nechatnsmere, the site of a battle during which the King of Northumbria came a right cropper against the Picts. It was windy, but it didn't rain much, which was a disappointment since I didn't have much water and had planned to collect some rain.

Eight or nine miles the next morning, I was on the slippery seashore at Arbroath, with another challenger. Before catching the bus to Montrose, we repaired to Wetherspoons for beer and curry.

And then we went home and told our mums all about it.

Peter Pan in Kirriemuir.

East coast rape fields

Windy night at Nechtansmere

The End

The huge walk from Fort William was beautiful and challenging and I enjoyed it and felt a bit smug about it afterwards. But it's too tough for an old codger. It's unlikely that I'll try anything like that again. 

Good, though.......It's all in the mind....

And I've fooled blogger by saving the file and coming out of blogger and back in again after each save.

Brenda-Dawn Linney 1948 to 2024

 

I'll keep this pretty simple. My friend, Dawn Linney died the other day and this is a post to recognise her life and to record and celebrate a bit of what we did. Mostly, it will just be some pictures taken on our various adventures. I'll leave it all here.

We met on Kirkby Stephen railway station one winter's lunchtime with an intention of walking over Mallerstang Edge to Garsdale and walking back again over Wild Boar Fell. There was a blizzard, followed by an Atlantic storm and a quick and soggy thaw. We didn't get far. This followed a strange experience in St Cuthbert's shrine in Durham Cathedral whilst chilling from some Christmas shopping in Durham. I can't go into detail because I neither understand nor believe it but the positive outcome was 12 or 13 years long, mostly walking, backpacking, swimming, bivvying and generally enjoying things. 

Camp on Cadair Idris

Then there was a blizzard,,,

Maybe in the Peak District

Boots off for the standard was to cross a Scottish burn

We visited the high bits of England, the Borders, Highlands, and lumps of Wales. We did the South Downs Way one hot September and we joined up the highest pubs in England from Staffordshire to Tan Hill and over to Kirkstone Pass. Mostly, I also had LTD with me, and sometimes, often, John Jocys came, sometimes with others.

I had to get Dawn rescued from Knoydart and from the Howgills when illness struck - but she continued afterwards, gradually losing strength and range.

The last few years, her ability to walk anywhere, let alone the hills, deteriorated significantly. She was plagued by Parkinson's disease and was, sometimes depressed and she hated being in groups of people, or noise and bustle, so escaping from That London to the relative quiet of Blyth with it's proximity to hills and fun, was Just The Thing.. 

She'd had an extraordinarily difficult life prior to our meeting. I'm not going to repeat what happened, and part of it is recorded by Dawn herself. But it's not for me to pursue this here, but I'm sure that being out in the vastnesses of hills and also empty Northumberland beaches was a proper salve. I think that her life did improve when she moved to Blyth and her circle of friends expanded in a big way.

In particular, she joined the Panama swimming club, a group that swims weekly in the North Sea on Tyneside, all year round and which she enthused about. In return, they supported her right through to her final days and, in the end, organised her funeral, for which Dawn had already paid and sorted with a funeral director. Members read to her from Nan Shepherd's "The Living Mountain", a book I had coincidentally bought as in-tent entertainment for this year's TGO challenge. Maybe a coincidence, maybe not.

Dawn was exceptionally generous (maybe people who don't really have much in the way of assets are often more generous than those who do) Her last gift to me was her Trekkertent, which I will use on this year's TGO challenge - but I have loads of her kit, from jackets to stoves to maps that she gave me or hid in my car after trips, and which she always denied having any knowledge of. 

She also supported me when I took part on North-East skinny dips. It can be a scary business doing the skinny dips, which I once explained to her. So she joined in and, which, if you know her background, was an extraordinarily brave thing to do. As we ran into the sea, she said "I can't believe I'm doing this!"  It'll  be a relief to you that I haven't included any pictures!

And  I must recognise the staff of Ward 2 at Wansbeck General Hospital who were especially kind at the end and professional and respected her wishes not to rescusitate.

Dawn has a beautiful spot at the Northumberland Woodland Burial site near Morpeth. There will be a rowan tree to mark the spot in due course. I drive past the spot fairly regularly, so I will pop in and, maybe cast some wild flower seeds...

For those who have got this far - this was read at the graveside . Its from the prophet Khalil Gilbran

For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into the sun?

And what is it to cease breathing but to free the breath from it's restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?

Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing.

And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb.

And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.

Wet Wet Wet

 

I'm so old now that I remember when Wet Wet Wet were just a bit damp.

It seems that it's been raining since September. Occasionally, just now and then, the rain has turned to snow. But mainly, it's been raining. Then, after a wet spell, there's been an Atlantic storm, followed by showers. Often, drizzle has been driven in sheets across the fells and moors. Drizzle goes through everything.  Precipitation is the name of the game.

I'm not complaining, though. Actually, I am complaining. I'm fed up. My boots are permanently wet. The dog has started wearing armbands. When I get the lead, he brings me the umbrella. In general,though, he doesn't shiver and whinge when he's wet. Ringo is, in fact very tough. He doesn't seem to care at all about cold and wet. He laughs in the face of a wet gale. He wags his tail at miserable glaur. He's an idiot.

I must admit, that on several occasions, I have taken to wearing the wellies. These are perfect for slopping through the slutch (Lancashire onomatopoaeic  dialect word for sloppy mud; consider the noise made by a welly being extracted from slippery mud). Also, puddles and streams up to a couple of feet deep can be sploshed through with impunity. On the downside, anything over about 8 miles starts to get uncomfortable and the grip on steep grass leaves a lot to be desired and you can't take them off without also removing your socks.

Most walks nowadays have ended with wet undies (from the rain, stoppit!), despite the armory of Paramo and nikwax and my rucksack starts to push my trousers down, including the baselayer, after a few miles of driving drizzle, meaning I have to walk with one hand holding up the pants and one hand stopping the dog from inserting himself into rabbit holes, hunting hares, heading around the back of flocks of sheep or greeting strangers enthusiastically. Maybe I should just buy some new kit.

I'm supposed to be training myself up for the TGO challenge and Crook and Weardale Ramblers (I'm the secretary y'know) never/hardly ever cancel a walk and defy the worst and heaviest rain in the hope that it might brighten up. And we're training up for a crack at the Three Peaks of Yorkshire in June, so we have to do longer walks despite the storm. 

And there's a bloke up the road building an ark. Apparently he's had some kind of angelic visitation informing him that we're in for a wet summer.