100: cien, cento… A Hunner!

I’ve been writing this blog for well over a year and have found myself here... at post number 100!! How did that happen?!

To mark such an occasion I thought it would be a good idea to do a "special edition" post and so planning ahead, I got in touch with someone who’s blog I love reading. Someone who inspires with fantastic accounts of his adventures in the mountains with his mates. He is one of the only people I would ask or indeed let write a guest post here. So, I asked. He delivered. And for that I am really grateful. Readers and listeners, I give you a special edition 100th post by PTC* ...

A Hunner

It was all different in my day, wool socks, hobnail boots, checked shirts and everyone had a beard. It was the law.

Ange popped up on my blog when she was getting ready for her Everest Basecamp trek, there was some gear banter and if I remember rightly some last minute decisions. Sticking your arse on an airplane and heading to the highest of high ground is certainly an interesting way to start your hillwalking life!

Since I’ve been on the internet I’ve been in comms with a whole range of folk, and many are making their first steps onto the hills, or finding their way off the beaten tracks or carrying a tent for the first time.

It keeps dunting my memory back into life, and although my joy at being in the hills has never diminished, there’s no way (without surgery) to relive all those “firsts” again. But, I still remember my first Munro, my first wildcamp, the first time I stuck an ice axe into neve, aw man, that’s the stuff we need. Hearing about folks plans, and their excitement at finding their own firsts is fantastic, to know that our wild places are being found by eager feet and amazed eyes, that they’ll be explored and loved when I’m decrepit and drooling in my bath chair and long beyond, makes me grin all the wider.

Blogs have enabled folk to connect, to inspire and be inspired. I can read and feel my spirits lift as someone has made the most of a day that I had missed and I can write and revel in capturing a recent memory that might lighten the gloom of a Monday morning in an office somewhere, even for a minute.

Photo credit PTC*

I envy Angela in some ways, she’s getting her feet on some great hills and she has a stack of firsts to conquer after she’s done the shopping.

So, let’s list… lightweight tent, sleeping bag, sleeping mat, stove, ice axe, crampons, down booties and mitts… Your just lucky hobnail boots are out of stock right now.

Alright!

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Well folks, I hope you enjoyed this “special edition” 100th post, I did! Like he said, we exchanged some banter about gear and hills via his blog a few months ago, and I finally met PTC* at Rowardennan a little after 5.30 on a school night in June. This was for my first jaunt up Ben Lomond and it was great! I was nervous. My first proper hill-walk since returning from Nepal and here I was with a new walking buddy. Turns out I had no need to worry at all. For the first time in a long while I rediscovered why I started hill-walking in the first place - with no pressure and not a tick-list in sight! Why I wanted to get out into the mountains, to have new adventures and loads of "firsts". It was brilliant! I learned he wasn’t just a good writer too but has an incredible enthusiasm for the great outdoors and a vast encyclopedic knowledge of the Scottish mountains... oh and kit too! I knew this was someone I would be friends with.

PTC* surveying a new route!

If you haven’t already done so I would recommend you take a wee shifty over to PTC*s blog at www.petesy.co.uk and have a read. You’ll like it.

Finally... PTC*, huge thanks for doing this mate, much appreciated, and thanks for inspiring me to get out there... Alright!

Ange :o)