Reviews

Yorkshire Limestone – Millenium Supplement

The Yorkshire Limestone Supplement is now in the shops at the very reasonable price of £3.95. It includes a complete revision of Gordale Scar featuring 34 major new lines, 12 new routes on Dib Scar, a new crag, Caygill Scar and much more.

While most of the routes are hi the hard grades there are five routes on Raven Scar at Severe and below some of which have been experienced by your correspondent and our President.

Like the definitive guidebooks this supplement is published by the Yorkshire Mountaineering Club and edited by Dave Musgrove. No Yorkshire Climber should be without it.

Bill Todd

Craven Pothole Club Record
No. 46. April 1997

With regularity which would be monotonous were it not for the liveliness of its contents, the Craven Pothole Club has come up with its 46th record.

The descriptions of exploration and adventure underground are in this issue varied by an account of a winter meet in Lakeland which saw absolutely atrocious weather.

Strangely there is no aboad meet recorded but there is an article by Matyas Vremir and Marta Veress from Romania who had a very enjoyable visit to Yorkshire invited by Hull University and looked after by C.P.C. The article is as much fun as the caving. Like all C.P.C. Records, worth a look.

Bill Todd

Karst and Caves of Great Britian
by A.C. Waltham, M.J. Simms, A.R. Farrant and H.S. Goldie.

Chapman and Hall, London, pp. 358, £115

I was chatting with an archaeologist some years ago who had a prehistoric artefact made of yellow stone on his mantelpiece. I asked him what the rock was, ‘Limestone’ was the reply. I was temporarily nonplussed because every Yorkshireman knows what limestone looks like and it certainly does not look like yellow soap. Then a long forgotten item of knowledge came to my rescue, ‘Ah, Jurassic’. “That’s right’, said Lawrence, slightly surprised that I had ever heard of the word.

The diagram on page 3 of this book makes it clear that the Jurassic Oolites are officially limestone, just like the chalk of the South Downs. They both come within the purview of this veiy absorbing attempt to list and describe the most important areas of Great Britain where the detail of the land surface is due to the action of drainage through soluble underlying rock.

After a learned introduction subsequent chapters deal with the principal karst areas in turn. Of course, our own Yorkshire Dales is the biggest (pp. 70) section followed by the Peak District, Mendips, Wales and Scotland. There is a separate chapter on the North Pennines, from Amside to Asby. Before this appears some of us will have seen the latter under Ian’s guidance on the Ladies Meet. The chapter on Outlying Areas, includes Beachy Head, Buckfastleigh and the Devil’s Punchbowl.

In many ways this is a grown up version of Tony Waltham’s excellent ‘Caves, Crags and Gorges’ (Constable 1984). It contains a lot more science and not quite as many photographs.  
But the photos it does include are very good, I wish I had taken them myself.

Climbers who have experienced the peculiar delights of loose limestone will be surprised to learn from the introduction that it is a ‘strong rock, capable of spamiing large underground voids and forming stable cliffs’. I suppose ‘stable’ need not apply to eveiy hold but when whole sections of crag fall away as happened on the first ascent of ‘Piddler’ on Blue Scar the word seems a bit optimistic.

In the whole world twenty-eight cave systems longer than 50km have been explored. Yorkshhemen will be proud but not surprised to learn that one of the principal ones. Ease Gill, is in Yorkshire. The authors are confident that a link-up with the Kingsdale system will soon be achieved making a single system in excess of 100km (62 miles).

This book should be of interest to all members whether cavers or not and it is in the club library for our use.

Bill Todd

Kinabalu Escape, The Soldiers’ Story
R.Mayfield, R.Mann & M.Dunning.

Constable, London, pp. 282 H/B £14.95

A Board of Enquhy was held at York from 25 April to 24 May 1994 to investigate the planning and conduct of exercise Gully Heights. Readers of my review of the officers’ book will recall that this involved the first ever descent of a precipitous stream bed by a team of British and Hong Kong soldiers. The two officers and the Hong Kong soldiers were marooned part way down and were rescued by helicopter after the rest of the party had descended the gully and fought then way through jungle to raise the alarrn This book is by Lance Corporal Mayfield, Technical Adviser to the expedition. This means he was adviser on abseiling and rope techniques. Bob Mann was with Mayfield a lot of the time and contributes to the book.

It is a riveting book, about people and adventure. All the more so if you can grasp the modem army slang and the proliferating morrntaineering qualifications. What we used to call a ‘skive’ is now a ‘proff and the qualifications are JSMEL, JSRCI, TR&A, and ML., which, by the way, is not our now familiar Mountain Leadership Certificate but is a Royal Marine qualification and requires an eight month course. It’s a far ciy from the days when we used to run rock climbing courses at Dkley without a certificate between us. I don’t recall any student ever suffering injury.

Compared with the officers’ book something of a worm’s eye view is conveyed. Lt. Col. Neill is the boss and lightly decides what is going to happen. I cannot escape the impression that the expedition is the last bid for fame by an ageing officer. Shades of Captain Scott. It seems unfortunate that he led from the back and was handicapped by illness at a vital stage. He had been to the area twice before.

Ah well and good but you don’t put chaps in an Everest team after three days instruction in snow and ice technique, even if they are fit and athletic to start with. And this was going to be a series of long abseils covering thousands of feet of unknown country, a tall order even for experienced climbers. At the trahiing weekend in Yorkshire an abseil down Malham Cove was on the programme.  ‘Unsettled weather’ caused this to be cancelled and Rip on climbing wall was used instead. I would have thought that half a dozen abseils down Malham Cove in wet weather would have given the team something of a taste of what they were in for.

Another thing, of course, is that there was no long term friendship between the members of the expedition except for the two officers. During the expedition the NCOs seem to have ‘bonded’ if that’s the word, with one particular mate only. This becomes particularly evident when the five British soldiers having left the gully are making then difficult way through the jungle hi search of habitation. Three of them were cooking breakfast, the other two had no food so set off walking. Both parties reached safety separately.

But why did only three people have food? Why didn’t the senior insist on a share-out? Who was in charge anyway?

There were two Lance Corporals qualified in top roping and abseiling. This meant a week long course doing single pitch work under fifty feet. One of them was also a Joint Seivices Mountain Expedition Leader, a mountain walking qualification acquired on a two week course. The other Lance Corporal, the author, was a Joint Seivices Rock Climbing Instructor. This was a course only available to climbers of two years standing, it lasted twenty days and emphasised rescue and teaching.

There was a full Corporal who as well as TR&A had some jungle training and was designated still photographer. The Sergeant had had some ‘adventure training’ and was designated ‘video recordist’.

No-one had a commanding collection of both rank and skills; a not unfamiliar military situation for the man with the most rank to be the least qualified. All the more reason, therefore, for the officer in charge to have laid down a clear chain of command for the advance party before losing touch with them. The result was several days of leadership by committee meeting and the fact that lives were not lost is solely due to the sheer guts and deterrnination of the men. The journey through the jungle was an absolute nightmare. Thorns and leeches, crags and ‘bastard trees’ and the nightmare did not stop after the author reached hospital.

The findings of the Board of Enquiry included:
–    The Army’s commitment to adventurous training remains.
–    More stringent qualifications will-be required for those supervising abseiling.
–    The planning for this expedition was conducted thoroughly and professionally.

It seems to this reviewer that there is all the difference in the world between a training exercise and exploration. The former must be finite and suited to the stage of the trainee. The latter should be done by a self motivated elite and preferably on leave, vide Younghusband’s travels in Central Asia.

In spite of the fact that the team bristled with qualifications there was still a crisis and planning should have included full contingency action to take care of the unforeseen.
Read the book and see if you agree with me.

Bill Todd

The Elusive Expatriate
John Buchan: the Presbyterian Cavalier
by Andrew Lownie

Constable 1995.

Biographies of great men used to tell only about then successes; we got cardboard figures of impossible ability and virtue. Janet Adam Smith’s 1965 biography of John Buchan was after this style.   Then things changed; these people were not one hundred per cent selfless.   We were delighted to learn that    General   Wavell   asked for promotion, that Lord Baden Powell eased his sister out of the post of Chief Guide in favour of his young wife, and that John Buchan asked for a GCVO for his services in the 1914-18 war.

This is an excellent book.  It does not diminish it’s subject and is a credit to the author. I enjoyed every one of the three hundred odd pages and many of them gave me more insight into a man I have admired for fifty years. We got a recognisable picture of a unique human being, sometimes irritable, forgetful of his wife’s bhthday and capable of astringent remarks,  hi spite of shining at Oxford he did not in fact sail through life with ease.   He went to the local grammar school as a day-boy and to the local  university  where  he  won a scholarship to Oxford. Already he was making some useful pocket money from wilting which he continues while at Brasenose College. His earnings in due course enable him to take a full part in undergraduate social and sporting life and to get to know some of the scions of the estabhshment.

In case you are wondering why this review appears here I should point out that John Buchan was a mountaineer. In his sixties, as Governor General on a tour of Canada, he climbed a cliff face which none of his aides fancied, solo. History does not relate whether there was an easy way down.   Two of the Richard Hannay books contain climbing sequences. Hanney’s climb up to the Col Das Horondelles in ‘Mr. Standfast’ could be a prose version of ‘Excelsior’ such a vivid impression is conveyed of the ‘world of snow and ice’. In “The Three Hostages’ the final confrontation with the villain takes place on a Scottish crag.

But the best warranty of JB’s provenance as a mountaineer hes in a short story he contributed to the S.M.C., Journal in 1907 entitled ‘The Knees of the Gods’. In the story the Cuilhns were made a climbing reserve and fancy railways were forbidden. It must be a mark of true genius that something written ninety years ago should so accurately reflect current concerns. If only we could be sure fancy helicopters would stay forbidden. We leani that Buchan was far sighted strategically as well as mountain-wise. Speaking of a future in the 1930s he said ‘the first stage will be a conflict in the air for the mastery of the air’. This, of course, is what Goeiing sent his Luftwaffe to achieve in 1940. Surprisingly Buchan was not associated with Gordonstoun or the Outward Bound movement but he was associated with T.E. Lawrence, A. P. Wavell and B.H. Liddell Hart in a scheme to train boys in leadership and outdoor skills. I suppose the idea was to harness Lawrence’s fame as an ideal for the nation’s youth as Baden Powell’s fame had done earlier.

May I conclude with a note on JB’s sense of humour, something which is not readily apparent from his distinguished career. Edward VIII’s attachment to Mis. Simpson must have shocked his Calvinistic soul but he contended himself with remarking in a letter to his mother, ‘It was as if a British Admiral had apphed for the post of thud mate on an American tramp’. A remark worthy of a Yorkshireman.

Bill Todd

The First Fifty Years of the British Mountaineer Council. A Political History.
Edited by G.Milburn, D.Walker & K. Wilson.

The British Mountaineering Council, Manchester, pp. 321.  H/B £16.99

It is generally agreed that little of excellence is ever produced by a committee. The last time this happened with a book the product was the King James Bible and as far as I know all great books since then have been written by individuals.

It is greatly to the credit of all concerned that this ‘Political History’ is so good.   Indeed, it falls short of excellence in minor respects only, e.g. in quoting 1899 as the date of the foundation of the Yorkshire Ramblers’ Club, and I think I know why.

Imagine one of the editors, or one of the contributors, more likely Geoff Milburn as it is always the boss who does the dogsbody jobs that fall within nobody’s job description. Imagine Geoff Milburn, I don’t know Mm so it is not easy, faced with the job of listing the key dates in the political history  of British Mountaineering. Easy enough to start, formation of the Alpine Club. The next group of clubs were the acknowledged senior clubs, Climbers, Fell & Rock, Rucksac all now full of years and honours but when the dickens did they start? T know,   Clark   and   Pyatt’s 1957 ‘History of Mountaineering in Britain’ must have sometliing’. The book fell open at page 275, bibliography, the last entry is ‘Yorkshire Ramblers club Journal, the ‘1899’ that will do. The only other little niggle I have is that George Steele’s membership of the Yorkshire Mountaineering Club isn’t mentioned. It is probably wrong to blame the editors for that however, it may be George concealing his humble origins.

But what a mine of information we have there; it’s worth the money for the photographs alone. Most of the big names in mountaineering in the last fifty years have served the BMC in some capacity, notably Yorkshire’s own Dennis Gray. Other Yorkshire climbers mentioned include Y.R.C. members Peter Swindells, who sadly died earlier this year and Roy Pomffet, the late Jack Bloor of the Gritstone Club, Mike Dixon whom few now remember, sic transit gloria, Angela Soper and Johnnie Lees. It is also interesting to be reminded of what Sid Cross looked like in 1960 when he was photographed with a group of Soviet mountaineers.

The text of course, if where most of the information is, exhaustive and exhausting. One feels that no stone is left unturned in telling the stoiy of the inception and growth of the organisation and the activities of all its committees, functional and regional. Though I have no doubt the writers and editors agomsed about what to leave out. Geoffrey Winthrop Young was the first to raise the idea, in 1907, that there should be a representative body for British mountaineers. He returned to attack 37 years later during Ms presidency of the Alpine Club with strong support from John, now Lord Hunt, who pushed the character building and forces training angle.

The first meeting was held in December 1944 and the rest as they say ‘is history’. But while looking back it ah seems inevitably httle of value would have been achieved without the efforts and support of some well known climbers whose names are enshrined in mountaineering Mstoiy. These include Pigott, Chorley, MacPhee, Goodfellow, Lougland and Moularn who all served as president in the early days followed by Bonington, Wahnesley, MacNaught-Davis and the late Paul Nunn.

I found it strange to read that climbing used to be dangerous before modem safety methods were invented. Ask Dave Musgrove, most people led up to V. Diff and the occasional mild severe, yes, that describes me in my heyday, the top climbers aspired to V.S. and were proud as punch to lead Kipling Groove and Cenotaph Comer. Mind you, in those days the rale was that the leader must not fall. If you couldn’t lead a pitch you were supposed to come back down and wait for a better climber to do it. but there was always the odd maverick who put in a piton or two and got up, then a bigger maverick who led it clean.

Climbers being an anarchic bunch there was opposition to the formation of the B.M.C., a lot of it from the establishment of the Alpine Club, including the notorious Colonel Strutt who had already made a name for himself by condemning people who climbed without guides. There seems to have been a fear the B.M.C., would usuip the position and influence of the senior clubs; and I suspect, a concern that the wrong types would be encouraged into mountaineering. Especially as about this time the working classes were beginning to get hohdays with pay. Good heavens, what’s the world coming to? But it is no good trying to do justice to this very fine book in a short review. Eveiy page you open it at has something of interest or somebody you know or know of. Buy it and be assured that your spare reading time will be enjoyably filled for some time to come.

Bill Todd

The Ordinary Route
by Harold Drasdo, drawings by G. Mansell

The Ernest Press pp.258 stiff P/B £12.50

This review takes the form of a letter to the author.

Dear Harold,
Congratulations on a fine book and an excellent choice of artist for the illustrations. As well as entertainment you have said some things that needed saying about our sport and related subjects, some of which I have been thinking myself.

It’s funny too, I can just see Mike Dixon jacking up the price of something he was selling, especially after you had just reminded him that being a millionaire was no great shakes these days. I also enjoyed hearing about the man who, applying for membership of a senior club put ‘rag merchant’ as his occupation. Years later the same chap raised his eyebrows when I mentioned that I had joined a (different) senior club. He must have thought, probably rightly that wool reprocessors were socially superior to accountants.

It was a good idea to break the book up into groups of chapters subject wise. It has meant that even well into the book a figure from the past can pop up to the delight of those readers who knew him. I enjoyed the reference to the Skye boatman in the middle of the chapter in Ireland and to the Cumberland wrestler on the same page.

The chapter group on adversity has well chosen sections on Falling Off, Getting Lost, Involuntary Bivouacs and, of all things, Guide Book writing. I enjoyed your account of the Harter Fell Gully.  I climbed this, solo, in August 1953 but remember nothing of the chockstone or the rotting sheep.

It is good to know that other nations are no more original in then mountain names than the British. I refer to the Greeks. When I started your chapter on Cavall Bemat my head was in Majorca and the mention of Profitas Hiis by Mount Olympus brought memories of Rhodes. I expect these are the Greek equivalent of Raven Crag, Creag Ddhu or High Fell.

More seriously I particularly like the point you make about The National Trust. I used to regard it as a body that acquired wild country so that people could walk over it for ever. Now, as you say it seems to be in the property development business. You may remember when we were charged a shilling to go into Brimham Rocks. Now the National Trust has it admission free but parking is around a pound and there is a crowded gift shop instead of just the wooden hut cafe that the two old ladies ran. You do well also to remind us of the historical basis of all land ownership, seizure.

I do like your title. Perhaps, as an ordinary sort of chap who is proud of having put up North Buttress Ordinary on Guise Cliff I should declare an interest. I must also admit that I top-roped it first largely because the mantelshelf ledge was covered with heather. The removal of the latter would now be a criminal offence.

With true Yorkshire canniness you assure your readers that you have omitted any account of your highest mountain, nearest miss or most agonising decision. This reticence will ensure that eveiyone who enjoys this book, and that means everyone who reads it, will be queuing to buy Harold Drasdo’s next book.

Bill Todd

The Scottish Mountaineering Club Journal,
Vol. XXXVI, No. 188, 1997

Is it a sign of old age when an article purporting to deal with the long ago talks about alterations to a camp site in Glen Brittle which wasn’t even there when you first went? Joan and I knocked at Mr. McCrae’s door about 1.00pm to say ‘Please is there anywhere we can camp’? Nobody will be surprised at the answer we got, “Camp where you like in this glen, there are no drifters here”.

But what a feast of reading we have. Even if you’re not much interested in the lists of new routes and new Munroists the activities of the SMC and JMCS at home and abroad are the stuff of which dreams are made.

There is an article, strangely enough, about John Buchan’s mountaineering credentials which told me a lot I hadn’t known. There are three pieces on Skye which are absorbing. One on first ascents, of mountains not rocks, one by Bill Brooker about his first visit fifty years ago and one by two expatriates revisiting after a twenty three year gap. hi 1959 the Youth Hostel warden was Willie Sutherland who also ran tire bus service to Sligachan. I wonder if he was related to the Alex Sutherland who was warden when Bill Brooker went fifteen years earlier.

I have always been impressed by two items of Ben Nevis history. The first is the marathon journey by rail and bicycle which Messrs. Brown and Tough undertook to climb the North East Buttress. The other is of Graham Macphee who motor-cycled to the Ben every weekend from his work in Liverpool while working on the guide book. So please read the account by Alec Keith of Iris repeat of the Tough/Brown exploit with Macphee’s grandson complete with worn tweeds and the use of one bike. And see if you agree with what Malcolm Slesser says about sex in ‘A Merry Dance’.

The SMCJ is in the club library for your delectation.

Bill Todd

On Foot from Coast to Coast,
The North of England Way,
by David Maughan

Michael Joseph Ltd 1997 pp.178, S/B £9.99.

Which is your favourite long distance walk? The challenging Pennine Way, Wainwright’s wonderful Coast to Coast, the very attractive Dales Way, or perhaps Scotland’s West Highland Way?

David Maughan realised that for many the experience of walking coast to coast was so special they walked the route many times. With this in mind he accepted the challenge in the concluding notes of Wainwright’s book. He planned and walked a new route from Ravenglass to Scarborough, two places that lie on north/south rail routes.

He has written an enthusiastic little guide, ‘On Foot from Coast to Coast. The North of England Way’ which was published at £9.99 by Michael Josephy in early March. The two hundred mile walk follows the line of nine Youth Hostels through exhilarating scenery. It passes through Eskdale to Coniston and Windermere where it picks up the Dales Way. This way is followed to Cam High Road near Hawes for a turn off onto the Pennine Way to take you to Gayle. From there Maughan takes you down Swaledale to Jervaulx Abbey. This is followed by what he admits is a not so satisfactory twenty-one mile section to Thirsk involving much road walking. From Thirsk he takes you via Helmsley, Hutton le Hole and the Hole of Horcumto Scarborough.

Maughan has planned the walk to last 14 days but at the beginning of each clearly described day there is a useful chart of facilities available along die route including accommodation and bus services. So if should not be difficult to tailor the daily distances to suit yourself. Even if it is unlikely that you will be able to walk the whole route it would be a lovely little book to want to spur you to visit some of the many places of interest described along the way.

Beryl Houghton

Norwegian Mountains on Foot
Edited by Claus Helberg and translated by Arthur Battagel, Ame Bakke & Andrew Glasse,

Den Norske Turistforening, 1996, pp. 430

The Norwegian Mountain Touring Association has been in existence since 1868 and this book is a translation from the Norwegian of then latest guide to walking routes throughout Norway. It covers about 1000 routes most of which have caims/wayrnarks to help the traveller. The book shows Norway as divided into 36 areas, each with a sketch map showing numbered routes and a brief description of each route. The descriptions need to be brief to keep the book to reasonable proportions, 17’/2 by 11 cm and 280 grns in weight. This brevity has enabled them to include, in the English language version, an introduction giving infomiation about the D.N.T. and other useful information for foreigners visiting Norway and using mountain huts. It also has allowed some space for interesting stories of the history of some of the huts, people and places, e.g. Gjeudebu, Vorrneli, Shngsby and Mohn, and Vettismorki in Jotunheimen. Only the solitary backpacker would not consider this book worth its space in a rucsac.

The route descriptions vary in the detail they give. The great glacier crossings, like Jostedalsbreen and Alfotbreen, have very simple directions. The first three hours of a twelve hour journey from Fabergstolen to Vetledalseter has the directions, ‘Northwards on the west side of the river through tangled birches, then partly in dwarf woods and partly across bounders and moraines to the snout of Lodalsbreen.’ The remainder of the route has three more sentences and this is not a caimed route but not a complex one either. For each route there is a unique number and title giving the start and finish places. Then the walking time, the maps required, and the directions which give mention of cairns, paths and the method of crossing streams, as well as the description of the route to be followed. Most of these routes will be shown on the maps as a path even when there are no marks on the ground. Checking known routes indicates a high degree of accuracy in description and that the times given are walking times not total journey times.

For each area there is a sketch map, without contours, showing huts, villages, roads, lakes and routes. There is also a broad description and history of the area and lists of D.N.T. and privately owned huts/hotels with the facilities they offer. There does not seem to be a simple explanation of how routes are chosen for inclusion but there are no climbing routes. All glacier journeys are said to need climbing equipment and skill, and there are other places where use of a rope is advised. Most of the routes go between villages or huts but there are some mountain ascents. On top of all this, despite the number of routes included there is plenty of space between them to find your own way and have your own adventures.

This admirable book is in the Club Libraiy for our enjoyment.

Derek Smithson