Category: Uncategorized

Teamwork, Challenge, Failure & Fun

Back at the Field Studies Centre, I delivered a bushcraft session to 11 and 12 year old children yesterday. With a focus on teamwork in groups of 3 or 4, the children had 30 minutes to build the structure of shelter they could all fit inside. Watching them enjoying the task and each other’s company, it was clear that motivation and group harmony were key to their success.

With three great looking shelters constructed, we moved on to fire lighting and our first attempt at making fire with cotton wool tinder and a magnesium flint. The rain and damp wood made this very tricky, even with a good pile of tiny, snappy twigs. Every group managed to light the cotton wool and coax a small flame from a few twigs but none us managed to keep it going into a fire.

The failure to light our fires and make herbal tea from the mint and nettles we had picked earlier was disappointing for all of us, but it was great material for a discussion. Prompted with a few questions, the children talked about the qualities they need to overcome failure and the support they can offer each other when facing tough challenges as a team.

After dinner, we went on a night walk up Hampsfell. Learning to walk in the dark and use their night vision was a big adventure for some of the children, until the rain clouds parted to reveal a bright moon and a beautiful view of its light shining on the wet sands of Morecambe Bay. All the children seemed lively, happy and in their element – in nature.

A Walk Around Kentmere

Liz and I took a blue sky walk over the western hills of Kentmere yesterday – Yoke, Ill Bell, Froswick and Thornthwaite Crag followed by a descent through the valley at sunset. The views were gorgeous and the light was beautiful but the best thing of all was too fast to catch on camera – a majestic stag appeared over the horizon and ran swiftly out of sight into the valley of Mardale.

RIMG0119
Quartz vein, moss & lichen
RIMG0125
Moss Close Up
RIMG0127
Lichen Close Up
RIMG0135
Liz walking towards Thornthwaite Crag
RIMG0142
Looking back towards Ill Bell
RIMG0148
Yoke, Ill Bell & Froswick

 

Van life, route setting and adventure education.

Living in a van is great for low costs, a low carbon footprint and working in the mountains. My high top, long wheel base Transit has enough space for a sink, hob, kitchen utensils, food box, cool box, water tank, wood burning stove, wood store, double bed, personal kit and all the equipment for Mountain Magic courses – ice axes, crampons, harnesses, helmets, waterproofs, climbing hardware, ropes, tents, maps, guidebooks and so on. However, 600 CDs, CD decks, DJ mixer, amplifier, speakers, boxes of books, two bikes and a big bag of clothes are in need of a place to stay for this chapter in my life.

Thanks to some very kind friends, Lancaster cellars have been great since the spring but they are notoriously damp and winter is coming. So, last week I went on a mission to deposit my surplus belongings in my mother’s dry loft. Since she lives over 300 miles away in Dorset, it was great to spend a day with her and I was lucky to find some work on the way down south too. Setting and testing 24 new routes from French 4 to 7b at Big Rock in Milton Keynes, I wasn’t exactly climbing fit but my shoulder is a few more steps along the long road to recovery since I injured it in the summer.

It’s good to be back in the Lake District this week. Working with teenagers from Manchester and Oldham, we have been scrambling over limestone rocks by the sea, jumping over tidal channels in muddy Morecambe bay, exploring tunnels and caverns in old slate mines, climbing in teams on high ropes courses, developing excellent teamwork on a low ropes course and building a raft from rope, planks and barrels. After two great days of adventure education work at Castle Head Field Studies Centre, I have a day off tomorrow, the forecast looks good and we are going out to play in the mountains.