News

I write this report at a time when most of us are planning future hostelling trips. It appears all wrong to me to be doing this in April on Grand National Day. This type of exercise should be carried out at the end of the year as the days shorten, not when British Airways can process your travel bags at a rate of 12,000 per hour and lose them in a huge warehouse in the name of progress. They celebrated this achievement.

Last year was one of celebration for the group. The group founded in 1937 had a birthday. Black Sail was a wet walk but enjoyable all the same. John led the Brecon weekend in warm weather. I arranged a weeklong walk in the Hebrides only to find that the accommodation had been cancelled unbeknown to myself. An anxious thirty minutes in Glasgow hostel at the reception desk worked out bed nights to fit in with the booked ferry sailings. The first walk was without a map in gale force winds and horizontal rain.

Slaidburn weekend was another wet one. I took along a red and yellow parasol that was very handy to keep off the heavy rain even though I very nearly did a Mary Poppins flight on a few occasions. I camped under it in the thunderstorm. Well it did have built in lightning conductor and I wore rubber-soled boots.

In August we had a birthday party at Kings hostel, which was also of the same age. This was truly a group event as everyone buckled down in order to make the occasion a memorable one. The party was held outside in the dark by a bonfire. The chairman was seen brandishing a knife and also cake in kitchen roll, as excellent confection baked by Rob. This was after the walk up and down Cader Idris.

A week was spent in one hostel in the Lake District. The view from the walkway to Keswick hostel was one of flooding. The river below was over the banks.

The Christmas weekend was spent in that 600-year-old former maltings. I never did find out the reason why there is no Bank of Wales. Alcohol flowed during the meal following which there were two surprise awards. One to Sarah for managing the oversight of all the catering requirements, of a bouquet of flowers. The second to Dave our trustworthy Hon. Treasurer for long service, of a pewter pint tankard with malt whisky to accompany, organised in secret by Mick. Stella is one knows her alcohol and folks’ needs.

In warm weather earlier this year, a pleasant time walking was experienced at Holbrook farm in Edale.

All in all an excellent year’s activities although day walks were few and very far between.

A week after the official opening of the ‘new’ St. Pancras, the group’s London weekend also took place. It was a good start, arriving into the famous blue canopied expanse - with time to admire the statue of Sir John Betjeman and Eurostar’s sleek gateway to Paris, complete with the accessible, if expensive champagne bar.

Avoiding such temptations (for the meantime) the number 17 bus takes you from the station to St. Paul’s - and seemingly within minutes - the hostel is there, just round the corner in Carter Lane. Andy, Alan, Patricia, Liz and Boh and I stored our bags and then mobile phone numbers, before venturing out on a well researched crawl of London’s best public houses in the area.

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A mass exodus, well at least half the members of Leicester Local YHA Group set off going west into the setting sun on a Friday evening. Wales is noted for its high rainfall. The weather forecast indicated that there was to be a sunny weekend with little wind but what there was would be from the cold north. One of the vehicles was carrying the kitchen sink well not really a sink but a circular washing up bowl, a nice red plastic one with a raised pattern around the side. It is known that some members pack all their wardrobe just in case it turns out to be cold; or very hot, or wet, or very wet or windy and wet. These folks are really in their element when the weekend is hot and wet, windy and cold. It is possible a first for the group to take such an item as a washing up bowl. Concern was expressed after eleven o’clock that one of our cars was missing. Kings hostel is situated in a river valley and has such has no mobile signal reception. Mick arrived at half past midnight to be greeted by Boh who directed the passengers to their respective rooms except that Stella found the dorm full and a torchlight viewing of the other girls dorm found a empty bed. One o’clock lights out.

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There is a saying that if you spend the night up Cadair Idris and live you will come down the next morning “Mad, blind or a poet.” (This is a genuine quote mentioned by the tourist board)

One can imagine the walker who fell asleep on Cadair and woke up in the dark with the full moon overhead. He or she then walked down the mountain towards Dolgellau and came into a thickly wooded valley. After a while stumbling in the dark he came across a clearing in the woods. There was a bonfire with various figures gathered around it. Then a formally dressed man with druidic looking white hair approached something on a table and drew out a knife. Thinking this was some ancient Celtic sacrificial ritual the walker rushed off into the woods in utter panic and was not found till morning………

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The Prelude

This trip kept changing before it began. It began in the Clarendon pub, after Alan helped me deliver three budgies to their Christmas retreat. Sans birds and a few pints later, we had sketched the plan - three days in the Hebrides. Were we budgie-brained? We changed the timescale to a week, then longer to take in the last May bank holiday. That week wouldn’t work because the ferry timetables are very respectful of specific dates. So we changed it to a week including two weekends, or eight Sundays, which is what it all began to feel like in the timeless spray freedom of the Outer Hebrides.

We changed everything except our minds; we would go there in one or two cars, as four or five persons, in meteorological suspense. Elusive and beautiful the trip was to be.

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Well Dave you asked for it - here goes! A different perspective on the Tanners experience. Seven intrepid explorers left Leicester in two cars - but this time one car (ours) left about 3pm and the other Chris, Sonia, Judith and Alice left considerably later, well after 5pm. Funny thing is - we still managed to meet up at the usual pub for dinner in Dorking. We were just leaving - their meals were just arriving. We debated the benefits and losses of our early start!

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Eleven of us went in 3 cars and Dave Anne and I went the cross country route from Droitwich via Leominster which is to be much recommended as an alternative to the M5/50 route. There was little traffic and the countryside was beautiful. We stopped in a US style diner on the edge of Leominster, expecting James Dean to come leaping out of the skirting but he didn’t appear (The staff’s Herefordshire accent rather spoiled the illusion.)

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Flicking through the pages of the shiny new YHA Accommodation Guide, Clyffe Pypard YH looked like a place that would appeal to our group. A 14-bed bunkhouse, interesting part of the country, attached to a pub! Three months later it was time to see if it would meet those expectations.

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Oh well, so you’ve missed another one. But, that doesn’t mean that I am going to stop putting these events on the Group Programme! It is not only because Chris and I enjoy playing our part in these gatherings, there are other reasons why Leicester Group should do its best to support this fading facet of YHA’s traditions.

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A very few stalwart group members supported the first weekend in 2007. This time of year the weather can be cold and frosty, wet and windy with snow flurries, grey skies overhead, and early darkness. Bearing this in mind the January weekend is usually a city break. This year Bristol YH was the destination.

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