Mountain Days
My interest in the outdoors can be traced back to my Scouting days, when I was a scout in the ‘Elloughton cum Brough Scout troop’. I joined the scouts as a young eleven year old. Our scout leader was a fantastic bloke called Bob Branton known to us as ‘skip’. He, with the rest of the troop took us on weekend and week camps all over the country, my favourite sites were Kibblestone in Staffordshire and Walesby Forest near Newark in Nottinghamshire. As I grew older I became a Venture Scout Leader which gave me the opportunity to take the older scouts ‘wild camping’ on the North Yorkshire Moors and eventually the Lake District. I pursued and completed my adult leader training and I completed my Queen Scout Award in 1973. During this time I undertook considerable training in First Aid especially from the instructors at the ‘St Johns Ambulance Service’ and received the relevant awards for my achievements, little did I know what it would lead me to several years later.
I left school at 17 years of age and as I was living within several hundred yards of ‘Blackburn Aircraft Company ‘it was expected that I would get a job there. The company was very good in that it provided good recreational facilities for its workers with occupational and sporting pastimes. I joined the squash club and also the Rambling Club. The Rambling Club was run by a small committee of like-minded walkers under the leadership of a gentleman called Tom Burret a very keen walker and Mountain Leader. I joined the group for local walks as well as walks further afield. The highlight of the year for me though was the annual Spring Bank Holiday when we would go away for the week as a group to the more mountainous parts of the country, namely the Lake District, North Wales, Scotland and even the Yorkshire Dales. We had some fantastic walking holidays, climbed a lot of mountains and made some great friends in the process and opened up a host of opportunities for me.
The images below are a selection of some of the places I visited with the Rambling Club and in later years with my young family.
In the 1970’s Digital photography was quite a long way off so all the images shown below were taken in a slide format, I have recently transferred the slides into dpi’s and put them onto my website, unfortunately the quality has faded somewhat over the years but still provides the viewer with a good overview of the scenery and environment which they were taken. Please ‘left click’ on the respective image to expand the gallery.
|
| Cairngorms 1978 |
|
|
|
| Isle of Arran 1979 |
|
|
|
| Ennerdale Horseshoe Walk September 1977 |
|
|
|
| Switzerland 1978 |
|
|
|
| Ben Nevis Easter 1980 |
|
| |
