Reviews
Craven Pothole Club Record
No. 47 July 1997.
Another record of adventure both above and below ground here. Unusually there is only one short meet abroad, a reconnaissance at Bad Urach. But the higher activities are a little more in evidence. A good Mayday meet at Nether Wasdale saw lots of people on Yewbarrow, Red Pike and Pillar.
Tom Thompson’s account of a week in Skye is hilarious and seems truthful. It is refreshing to know that the Pinnacle Ridge and the Clacli Glas-Blaven routes are not a walk-over even to active potholers. Definitely not the carefree scrambles some guide book waiters would have us believe.
Most interesting is the reprint of the late Winston Farrar’s account of his adventures in Gaskell’s passage of Goyden Pot. He did not know about Gaskell at the time.
This is reprinted from the Journal of the Pudsey and District Rambling Club of August 1931 and helps to make up a well rounded ‘Record’.
Bill Todd
‘Because it isn’t there’
Craven Pothole Club Record
No. 48 Oct 97
Mallory’s answer to ‘why are you going to climb Mount Everest?’ is well known. A reflection on page 12 of the C.P.C. Bulletin suggests that this would be an inadequate answer to ‘Why do you go caving?’ As a cave is by definition a hole or space it cannot be ‘there’ in any factual or material sense. Now, whether a caver can still say ‘because it is there’ and be flunking of the complex of rock formations and underground wonders that make a cave worth visiting, is a question I will leave to wiser heads.
As usual there are many articles on potholing at home and abroad and in addition the great above ground is acknowledged by a meet report on Skye and an article, nearly a poem, by a member who has retired to Edendale.
The record is in the Club Library for your delectation.
Bill Todd
Craven Pothole Club Record
No. 49 Jan ’98
An aspirant to membership of a Climbing Club was heard to say he didn’t rnind the clhnbmg but objected to the ‘infernal dangling’. Reading C.P.C. Record No. 49 I find myself tliinking that they go to some splendid places but why on earth do they keep disappearing below ground when they get there?
Six Britishers had a wonderful time in Meghalaya, India, with teams form Germany and from the Meghalaya Adventure Association. Their achievements and underground tun are graphically described by Estelle Sandford.
At the other end of the scale the President’s Meet consisted of a walk round Atteiinhe Scar. I thought I knew the country round there but I finished reading the article in a state of utter confusion.
The usual accounts of underground adventure in the UK make up forty pages of entertaining reading.
PS. New Goyden Pot, Nidderdale is in a dangerous condition due to a mud and clay slump.
Bill Todd
Walks in the Silverdale / Arnside Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty
R. Brian Evans
Reprint with amendments 1996 Cicerone pp 160 pb
Cycling to Lakeland as a youth from Lancaster my mates and I used to wonder about the conspicuous limestone hill on our right as we crossed Hale Moss. But our ambitions were on bigger game like Harrison Stickle and the Kentmere Fells.
It was not until much later that my wife and I were introduced to the wonders of Hutton Roof and Farleton Fell by the author of this splendid little book. It has been around for some time and indeed its first addition was a local best seller in the Preston area. The issue of the 1996 revision together with recent expansion of my own knowledge of the area has prompted this review.
The well planned introduction includes a general description of the area, short walks, the woods, geology, historic buildings and churches. A short section also tells you where to climb rock. Some of the crags are most attractive in the firmness of the rock, absolutely first class limestone.
The walks are described in twenty four chapters mainly circular but one deals with linear walks. The cross bay walk is described but, of course, this must be done under Mr. Robinson’s guidance. Illustrating the text are a dozen colour photographs and scores of line drawings many featuring dog Beck, sadly no longer with us.
It seems to me that members should know what this area has to offer because it represents a handy retreat from bad weather in Lakeland and/or a half day’s fun on the way home. This book will guide you at first then give great pleasure, as it has just given me, browsing, looking at the pictures and reliving some good days out.
Bill Todd
Short Walks in Lakeland. Book 2 – North Lakeland
Aileen & Brian Evans
s/b pp.271 £10.99
I have known Aileen and Brian Evans long enough to know there will not be any misdirections in this book so I am giving an opinion based on its coverage and its quality.
Like all Cicerone products it is to handle and easy to use; covering Mardale as well as Borrowdale and Bassenthwaite it should have perhaps been called ‘North and East Lakeland’ but this may have been considered an unwieldy title.
The area covered is divided into six sections; Borrowdale, Newlands and North West, Northern Fells, Thirlmere and St. John’s, Patterdale and Eastern Fells. There is a sketch map illustrating each of the 57 walks (no connection with Heinz) though readers are advised to carry a proper walking map as well. The sixteen colour photographs and numerous drawings add greatly to die charm of the book.
As far as the walks are concerned, – well! How often have we visited Castlerigg Stone Circle and regretted that there was nothing else to do but go back to the car and drive away? No longer, walk 28 takes us from Castlerigg past the old Y.M.C. hut at Dale Bottom to Shoulthwaite valley and its ancient hill fort, and back via Walla Crag. At nine miles this is one of the longer walks in the book. Other walks I can’t wait to do are Trusmadoor, Walk 22, next to Great Cockup (I am not joking), where Derek Clayton and I lost die hounds in 1991, and Combe Gill Horseshoe where Juliet and I had an icy epic in 1995.
People who want to stride over the ridges in fifteen mile days are catered for elsewhere but if you have walked over all the summits long ago and are looking for something less exacting and just as enjoyable dns is a book for you.
Bill Todd
Eric Shipton, Everest and Beyond
Peter Steele
Constable, pp.290 £18.99 h/b
“Framed between the dark walls of a canyon or standing above autumn tinted woods these peaks are lovely beyond belief.”
This quotation is front the penultimate paragraph of Eric Shipton’s report to ‘The Times’ on the Mount Everest Reconnaissance Expedition of 1951. Would it he too fanciful to conclude that some of the Mount Everest Committee members would shake then heads at this sort of writing? 1953 was going to be the last chance the British would have to climb Everest for the next four years. 1954 and 1955 were reserved for the French and the Swiss. Perhaps we needed a thruster to get to the top rather than some pale faced aesthete. Sliipton’s experience of Everest was unrivalled. He had been a member of five previous expeditions; five failures?
Most people will be too young to remember when it was announced that the 1953 Mount Everest Expedition would be led by a Major John Hunt. Most males had setved in the forces at that time and the appointment of a military man to lead was no guarantee of success to a lot of us.
It was well known at the time that Shipton favoured small, lightweight expeditions and like Bourdillon thought that the main requirement about food was that there should be some. A few members of the 1952 Cho Oyu Expedition had expressed dissatisfaction with his leadership and at a meeting of the Committee on 28th July 1952 Shipton himself said there could be a case for a change of leadership. In fact that meeting unanimously confirmed that Shipton would be leader.
After much behind the scenes discussion, however, at a meeting on the 11 September he was sacked in favour of John Hunt. Read all about it in what seems to be a veiy fair assessment of the situation.
Read all about Eric Shipton too, I had no idea what he looked like till I saw the cover photograph. I know now what people are talking about when they refer to his deep blue eyes. The picture also conveys something of a ‘little boy lost’ sort of look, quite the antithesis of his friend Tihrran who had given up on mountains in 1951.
The book of course, is not primarily about mountaineering politics. It is full of good things. Read how Sid Cross treated a hypothermic outward bound student and what Shipton said to the youngster who claimed to spend all his weekends with his girlfriend.
It was fortunate that Shipton was President of the Alpine Club when the merger with the A.C.G. took place, master minded I beheve by Yorkshire’s own Dennis Gray. There was a long debate about this but the merger went through with a 93% majority.
Eveiy reviewer needs to find a mistake if oidy to establish that he has read the book. Surely Dr. Steele does not beheve Harter Fell is at the head of Eskdale. We all know that there is a lot of Eskdale higher up including Hard Knott, Brotherelkeld and Throstle Garth. It must have been a slip of the pen.
Be that as it may this is a book that needed writing. The black and white photographs are excellent, it is well written and I thoroughly recommend it.
Bill Todd
Some Unique Yorkshire Towns
by Arnold N. Patchett
Pentland Press Ltd – ISBN: 1-85821-499-8
124pp h/b £12.50 available from the author
This is a fascinating book by an author who has researched his subject well. It is illustrated by photographs and some lovely sketches by Ruth Patchett. Even though one may feel that they know some, if not most of the places and things described, one is sure to come across nuggets of information to make one say, “I didn’t know that!” For instance, I have lived in the Leeds area all my life and conditioned by the days of coal, steel, heavy industry and the old A1 pre motorways. I tended to avoid places like Pontefract, Castleford and Rotherham like the plague, and reading this book has brought it home to me what I have missed. Similarly, Cawood was on the back route to York and the East Coast and Selby had the dreaded Toll Bridge. I suppose a lot of us may have missed great historical and other treasures by thinking on the same lines.
It is not what to include in this review which bothers me but what I may be leaving out. It has certainly stimulated my desire to visit the places described with new eyes and I heartily recommend the book to all who would wish to extend their knowledge of the treasures of our beloved county.
George Postill