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Showing posts from November, 2017

Mountain climbing: Why am I doing this to Myself?

There's something euphoric and insane about the act of mountain climbing. A bizarre spectacle, that is almost worshipped in some areas of our small, odd island, where brightly-clad people of all ages, backgrounds, and fitness levels go to areas of hills and decide, without questioning, that scaling one would be an excellent way to spend a Sunday afternoon. For me, this strange desire was bred in from childhood - most, if not all, of my childhood memories are in the Lake District or the Derbyshire Dales or the Yorkshire Moors; anywhere but the rolling agricultural landscapes of Hertfordshire, where I grew up. When I first decided to move away from home, to go to university, again it was this landscape that drew me in, that made me feel something that the gentle grasslands of my home county could not. Maybe it's my Northern blood - for hundreds of years, Lancashire-born family on my Dad's side have been throwing themselves at hills and hoping that they come back in o