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Friday 2 January 2009

A big discount











A chap I know only from an internet forum asked me to help him write a bit of a blurb to support a walk he’s doing with his pal and his pal’s dog from Fort William to Glasgow Rangers FC’s ground using the West Highland Way. The thing is, his pal is blind and the dog is his guide dog, Travis.

Its not the first time they’ve done this kind of thing and a while back they walked th Pennine Way. The idea is to try to get Rangers players involved in the project (not entirely sure how at the moment) – and the point is, I believe, to raise cash for a guide dog training centre near Forfar.

All good stuff, and I’m really chuffed about helping out. I’ll be posting posts about how things progress as they progress.

As I’ve never actually done the West Highland Way, I sort of wondered if a blogger and/or Northernpies reader who has done the route, or parts of the route, might like to cast an eye over the draft of the blurb to check it for idiocy – at the appropriate time.
This will be unpaid work, though you should get quite good karma from it.

To this end, I went into Durham today and bought a copy of Bob Aitken and Roger Smith’s guide to the walk which I will read backwards whilst hanging upside down from the banister. (because the guide describes the route from South to North, y’see)

Hopefully, the finished thing will be free from any noticeable plagiarism and will be quite a lot shorter than the guide, too.

I appreciate that this isn’t the way to do things.

Incidentally, the Cotswold shop in Durham recorded a price of £41000 when their till read the bar code for the book. Both me and the shop lad took the view that this was a bit steep and he scutterred off to find out how much it should be. A few minutes later, he gave me a £40085 (** edited to read £40985 following BG's comment. Dhuhhh... )discount, which I thought was reasonable.

Pics of Durham. Nice cathedral innit? And look at that knocker! Whoar! Can’t take pictures inside, but, for those who haven’t seen the interior, it is beautiful in a quite remarkable way. And its free. We like free….

9 comments:

BG! said...

Incidentally, the Cotswold shop in Durham recorded a price of £41000 when their till read the bar code for the book. Both me and the shop lad took the view that this was a bit steep and he scutterred off to find out how much it should be. A few minutes later, he gave me a £40085 discount, which I thought was reasonable.

I always said that Cotwsolds is an expensive place to shop - that must be some book for £915, Mike! Is it an original illuminated manuscript, or does it come complete with a Sherpa? :-)

Martin Rye said...

Kind of you Mike to help. I have done the WHW and would help if asked. Others who live North of the Boarder I am sure know more.

So new undies and lots of walks for you over Xmas. You'll be doing lots tops on the Challenge then? That dog is getting super fit with all the walks he gets. I reckon he does more hills in a year than most of the outdoor bloggers ;) Happy new year.

Mike Knipe said...

BG - Whoops - never was much good at maths - they charged £15 ish in the end.....
Martin- I'll let you see the writings as soon as they're writteen. I shoulda done it tonight, but I've been watching Rab C nesbitt and drinking Christmas whisky, so I'm not really in the mood just now... (hic)

Mike Knipe said...

Incidentally, I've got a few tops lined up for the Chally - a couple of Corbetts and some Monadhliath Corbetts and Munros and some Cairngorms and Lochnagar type of stuff. Its not a high level route, though by any stretch of the imagination...

Mike Knipe said...

Its no good, BG, I had to edit the post so that the maths work..

This is why getting somebody who's done the WHW to read my short description is such a good idea....

BG! said...

LOL, Mike :-)

I'm sure that your WHW planning will be OK, with folk like Martin around to chip in.

Happy New Year and all that.

Mike Knipe said...

Cheers BG, and an extremely happy New Year to you and everybody at Git Towers an'all.....

AktoMan said...

I've done it one and a half times and would be happy to help. It's not like hiking in the Yukon, or so I'm told ;-)

Posts and photos on my blog if you look at the sidebar of the full walk.

Mike Knipe said...

Great, thanks Aktoman - I think one and a half times should be more than enough. I'm going to have a determined session tommorrow and, provided I've finished I'll let both you and Martin have a look.
I need to get on with it now as I'm pratting about with it....