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John Piper: The Mountains of Wales....Review
JJagged rocks under Tryfan:1949-50 John Piper: the shape and tilt of rocksOur main purpose in popping over to Manchester last week was to see the John Piper exhibition at the Whitworth Gallery. Piper...
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Heroin Heroine......Cheryl Strayed's Wild-reviewed
In the world of outdoor writing,every so often a book comes along which transcends the genre and become a successful crossover work. Joe Simpson's Touching the Void was one such work. A book which...
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Darkness at Noon:The life and death of Nanda Devi Unsoeld
Following their magnificent summit success [on Nanda Devi] on September 1, Lou Reichardt, John Roskelley and Jim States descended to Camp 3 the following day. The second summit party of Pete Lev, Andy...
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Wild Mountain Time
Though the amount of our farm work had increased, we still climbed for pleasure and occasionally managed to go away for a night or two. One fine weekend, we went to climb the Great Gully on Craig yr...
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Rhapsody in Rust
I found this old unpublished homage to V Dubs recently. I'm not even sure what media it was originally intended for but the sentiments expressed may still ring true for afficienados of original VW...
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'Lord Baker' in Langstrath: Cam Crag Ridge
Siobhan Appleby above Langstrath.There was a lord who lived in this land Being a lord of high degree.He left his fort for a ship's boardAnd swore strange countries he would go see.Langstrath sounds...
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The Beautiful and the dammed
The two north-easternmost spokes in the great Lakeland wheel, Swindale and Mardale, could hardly be more different. To their west, or anticlockwise, the great glen of Ullswater cleaves down from...
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The mountaineers: lost in time.
Can you identify these five climbing amigos? Even better,can you suggest a location and date? I'm indebted to Climbers Club archivist David Medcalf for allowing me to use this fantastic shot. David...
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A Harry Griffin: A lifetime of mountains...a Eulogy
The following is the eulogy delivered by the Reverend Canon John Hodgkinson who conducted the funeral of Lakeland mountaineer and writer A Harry Griffin at Holy Trinity Parish Church, Kendal, Cumbria...
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Getting Lost: Leave the door open to the unknown
These days it’s pretty near impossible to get lost. Turn to Google maps on your mobile phone and that blinking cursor shows you exactly where you are; on city streets we’re tracked by CCTV, and by...
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Meeting John Taylor
John Taylor has died.Who was John Taylor? He was an ordinary unknown student climber,serious and ambitious about his climbing,but you won't have read his name in the magazines, until his death was...
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Perillos-Here be Dragons
John Redhead wired for sound in Corbieres'limestone country. And there, be Fembots.So. I ended Colonists Out by ‘emptying’ all that nonsense of material dwellings and allowed the Big Soul to enter. I...
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The undiscovered country
Brief as the lighting in the collied night, That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth, And ere a man hath power to say, 'Behold!' The jaws of darkness do devour it up: So quick bright things...
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Perfectly Mobile-Perfectly Still
Land Artists-Andy Goldsworthy,David Kemp and David Nash. SCULPTURE need not be a bronze statue of a town councillor or a marble figure of a goddess, respectfully plinthed in gallery or plaza; or a...
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Freedom Road: Ken Ilgunas' Walden on Wheels..... review
Photo Ken Ilgunas Collection Children are born with an innate sense of justice; it usually takes twelve years of public schooling and four more years of college to beat it out of themEdward...
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Northern Expressions
You know how quickly a route can assert itself upon your tied-on, racked-up and ready-to-climb enthusiasm: it grabs you when you think you're grabbing it. '6m right of a rowan', and the starting jugs...
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Doctor Johnson's 'Journey to the Western Islands'.
The Editor's command has made me get down from atop shelf a little squat duodecimo which I have not opened for many a year. I presume my copy is the first edition; at any rate it was issued in the...
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Continuity of Being
Following the recent publication of David Craig's eulogic essay on the land art movement, Perfectly mobile-Perfectly Still , artist and climber John Redhead was prompted to dust off and re-work an...
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The Boulder: a philosophy for bouldering...review.
I was less than half way through Francis Sanzaro’s The Boulder-a philosophy for boulderingwhen it struck me. I just haven’t got a clue what this guy is on about? It appeared that the author was...
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Ron Fawcett....Young Pretender
The following interview, entitled 'Ron Fawcett: A brief interview with the superstar of British Rock' first appeared sometime in the mid 70's in the Geoff Birtles edited Crags magazine. Unfortunately,...
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