Archaeology of North Wales – Mountain Leader CPD

Saturday 19th September

I arrived at Cefn Cae campsite in Rowen at 6.50, it only took 2 hours and 20 mins to get there. I had just enough time and light to get the tent up and my dinner cooked. I had a Look What We Found meal with rice cooked up in my Jetboil. The campsite cost £13 for the night and was a newly certificated Caravan and Camping Club site, it was very clean and well looked after. They operate an honesty system for buying quite an extensive range of supplies and I didn’t have to pay extra for a shower.

After dark, I read my book for a while. The stars were amazing and I could see the Milky Way.

Moon on Tay y Fan
Moon on Tal y Fan

IMG_0877 IMG_0878

Dawn on Tal y Fan
Dawn on Tal y Fan

Sunday 20th September

I’ve never really managed to sleep properly in a tent but this wasn’t too bad. I was warm enough especially with my little blanket. It was cold in the night and there was a heavy dew when I gave up sleep about 5.30. I had a cup of tea and then 2 cups of coffee and my breakfast of granola and yoghurt. I got to see the red dawn on Tal y Fan which was wonderful.

I packed up and drove up to Caer Rhun Roman fort (Canovium). There’s not a right lot to see, don’t be misled by the photo on the website, but the church is nice although it wasn’t open.

Then I met up with the group in the lay-by down the road. Jane Kenney is a senior archaeologist from the Gwynedd Archaeological Trust. The workshop is part of the CPD made available to members of the Mountain Training Association. The requirement is for 5 CPD points over 5 years and this is my second point since gaining the ML.

10 of us in the group. We got into 3 cars and drove up to a small car park some way above Rowen. We set off and the first thing to look at was the Roman road.

We then looked at long huts (rectangular), cairns with cists, hut circles, standing stones, a burnt mound and then a very good stone circle where we stopped for lunch. Jane was very good at getting us to look more closely at the structures and how to interpret them. She also didn’t try to give us all the answers as there is a lot that is not known and subjective but she clearly has a great breadth of knowledge. We then moved on past a reservoir and up to a slate quarry which is hidden away. Then it was time to head back passing 2 very prominent burial chambers, back onto the Roman road again and another stone circle just near the car park.

Fabulous, informative day with an expert. And a bargain to boot!

Last year’s walk.

We got back to lay-by around 5.15 and I got home at 7.45.

Burial chamber
Maen y bardd burial chamber
Church at Caerhun, sitting on the Roman fort
Church at Caerhun, sitting on the Roman fort
I think this is a green man
I think this is a green man
Big standing stone
Big standing stone
And another, not quite so huge
And another, not quite so huge
A cist
A cist
Very cheeky pony
Very cheeky pony
Stone circle
Stone circle
Another big standing stone
Another big standing stone
A peat house for storing peat
A peat house for storing peat
Burial chamber, marked on map as such
Burial chamber, marked on map as such
Burial chamber but not prominently marked on map
Maen y bardd burial chamber
Please visit Map and Compass and learn how to interpret a map and use a compass with me and my navigation partner, Cath.

MAPandCOMPASS

Mountain Training Association Conference March 2013

Friday 1st March

This is the first time I’ve attended this event. I arrived on Friday evening in Castleton Hollowford Centre after a long and tedious journey because the M62 had shut, so instead of 1 and a half hours it took 2 and a half for what as the crow flies is really not far from here.

I shared a room with Hazel and Liz. I got the top bunk which didn’t have the lovely steps up I’d seen in the photos of the centre but the usual very hard to climb in bare feet ladder.

I spent the evening with Hazel and some other people including Jim who reminded me very strongly of my dear Dave, so much so that I had to keep telling myself he wasn’t Dave but enough to bring up all the memories of the times we had and make me feel sad (Dave died in 1996).

Back in room 5, we democratically negotiated turning down the heating. I never have any heating on at all in the night but do understand that some like it hot! We also set our alarms for 3 different times, Hazel’s not on a round number. I am rather taken with this idea, having always rigidly stuck to the hour or quarters, with an occasional foray to a 20 or 35 minute so may even experiment!

Saturday 2nd March

We didn’t really need the alarms and got up and going for breakfast of poached egg, hash brown, beans and toms and toast. We received an intro to the centre and the conference and then set off in our groups.

I’d chosen to do “Lumps and Bumps” which was about how to teach navigation skills. 6 of us went off with Phil Dowthwaite who was great, he is a Mountain Guide which is about as far as you can go in the awards. The day worked as a refresher with some good tips for keeping it simple when training others. I liked this approach as it’s quite easy to make navigation very complicated and it doesn’t need to be. I’m planning to do some navigation training this year with Cath so this day was very timely. We had quite a short walk but it was great to be out in the sun and almost warm when we had our lunch (tuna roll, apple).

We got back to the centre quite early so I attempted to have a shower however it was a miserable experience with the water barely lukewarm despite mega efforts to run it hot.

There was a short gathering before dinner which now I can’t remember what was covered, then dinner was a choice of curries with rice and chips and a poppadom. I opted for spinach and chick pea which was tasty. Followed by apple crumble and cream.

A visit to the bar and then in to the main conference room for a lecture by John Beatty who is a photographer and who has had a long history in the outdoors taking photos. The photos and the stories were great, but he should have stopped at the point where we had the interval. The seating in the room was incredibly uncomfortable for 2 hours which didn’t help. It was the complete opposite of when I saw Ranulph Ffiennes last year, he just came on, did an hour racing through his slides and went off very promptly.

The bar was still open so we helped to drain it. The Farmer’s Blonde, a good local brew and renamed by me as Farmer’s Daughter had finished so Jim and I moved onto whisky. I felt this would help with sleeping in the bunk.

Hazel went off to the room and I followed shortly after. When I got there Liz was already in bed, and Hazel was just going in the bathroom. She went in plunging me into darkness. So I went into the corridor with my rucksack and rootled about for my torch. I was on the verge of helpless laughing at this point but managed to restrain myself.

Went straight to sleep and actually had a decent sleep.

P1010517
Oh, it’s a line of trees on the skyline!
P1010515
Big farm pussy
P1010518
The navigation workshop group

Sunday 3rd March

Breakfast was much the same but with waffles instead of hash browns.

Mal Creasey gave us an update on things the MTA is planning which includes modules on Hill Skills. WGLs and MLs would go for a couple of days training which will then allow us to deliver Hill Skills or Mountain Skills, or both, depending on which awards we hold. This is something I definitely want to do.

Then we got into groups for our workshops. I’d chosen “Environment for Mountain Leaders”. This was run by Jim Longley from Nature’s Work. There were a lot of us (15 incuding Jim) which didn’t really work for me as I had to make sure I kept close to Jim to hear what he was saying and every now and then I would forget and have to trot along to where he was. He knows his stuff and dropped in some teaching aids which I know my pal Cath would like, including an environmental version of what she and I call “People Bingo”, plus we sat and drew pictures of geological events, I was terrible at this. We stopped for lunch (egg roll, crisps, apple), then we were given cards with clues for tree identification. These were all great ideas and have spurred me on to think about doing some of these, I think trees would be a good one for me to do. I’m going to splash out and buy a laminator now that I’ve found I can get one for £20. Along the way, Jim treated us to sloe gin and rose hip syrup which he makes himself and he has links to various recipes from foraged foods on his Facebook page.

We looked quite a bit at geology and I felt I had to think quite a bit which was great. We saw some fungi and looked at sedges and rushes. It’s a real treat to be with someone who knows so much. Much colder than the day before and we walked a little further but a great day out.

Back at the centre for more food (sandwiches, nibbles and cake) and goodbyes. It took me 1 hour and 20 minutes to get home.

P1010534
Old landslip from the 90s. The land is still in motion.
P1010523
Sandstone changing to limestone
P1010526
Jew’s Ear fungus
P1010520
Peveril Castle
P1010545
Showing where rock has recently fallen off

P1010543 P1010527 P1010521

Footnote

The Peak District is much more badly littered than both Snowdonia and the Lake District and littered much more on the hills which is really depressing. If it was cleaner I probably would walk there more often. Mostly on the Lakeland hills, once you’re away from the car parks, there’s nothing much. I felt really depressed last weekend too when we were in Wales as it was just dreadful everywhere although fine once you’re off the main roads.

Please visit Map and Compass and learn how to interpret a map with me and my navigation partner, Cath.

css.php