What Does Adventure Mean to You?
DO you work in a factory, an office, a shop, or drive a company van? Are you a member of parliament, unemployed, a doctor, a refuse collector, a teacher or the chief executive officer of a...
View ArticleA Big Adventure
SO I’m off to live in Spain. Just thought I’d slip that into the conversation. I’ve been thinking for some time that I need a new challenge – a big challenge. And although I won’t be embarking on a...
View ArticleLucero ??? Where Old Hatreds Linger
LUCERO is a prominent pyramid of baked rock that looks ten times more a mountain than nearly everything twice, three times and four times its size. The approaches from the south are long and incredibly...
View ArticleAnd Finally, Lujar . . . Finally
McEff climbs Sierra de Lujar. It's his fourth attempt . . . Continue reading →
View ArticleIn the Realms of Glory on Cerro del Trevenque
CERRO del Trevenque is a dwarf among giants. It does not feature largely in the history of mountaineering. It probably doesn???t even warrant a footnote. But it is a mountain gem that shines like a...
View ArticleClimbing Cielo ??? as Swallows Come Back to Capistrano
A hot and dusty walk in the mountains of Andalucia . . . Continue reading →
View ArticleWalking up the Camino and Down Again
NOVEMBER in the Sierra Nevada. This camino runs from the rio Guadalfeo to Orgiva. It???s a back lane from a river to the centre of a small town. It is steep and long. Cars can be a problem. Goats can …...
View ArticleThe Sierra Nevada: Two Peaks, Two Countries
SPAIN gets under your skin and fingernails. It dries your eyes and your mouth. You can feel it in your hair and on your brow when your boots kick the dust of its white mountain tracks. You smell its...
View ArticlePaths, Goats ??? and Huenes to Pico de la Carne
THE joy of paths. There are indistinct paths that fade and confound; paths choked with nettles and brambles; malevolent paths that lead through mud and bogland; and paths that twist in the wrong...
View ArticlePlodding over Pinnel ??? In the Rio Guadalfeo
THE Rio Guadalfeo flows from the Sierra Nevada mountains through steep-sided valleys to the Mediterranean at Salobre??a. I???ve gazed down upon its course from the winding mountain road to Orgiva many...
View ArticleUntold Stories of High Haciendas
THE mountains are full of places where people lived, raised families and died. Their children and their children???s children have moved on. All that remains are stones and walls and the imagined...
View ArticleConiston Old Man ??? Backwards and Forwards
WHEN I was a teenager I made a pledge to climb Coniston Old Man at least once every year because it was the first mountain I climbed and it was special. I also grew up within sight of its familiar …...
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