There will always be numpties out there. What can you do. I would have no trouble doing that walk in the dark if I wanted to But anyone would be stuck with out a torch. Its a common problem that novices often underestimate how long a route will take. I cant undersand why they did not turn back when it started to get dark. Even if the cafe was open they still had a long walk down.

I few weeks ago I found a rather upset girl on Triffan North Ridge on a ledge saying she was stuck.

Dunno how long she had been there.

She was wearing jeans,those funny fashion trainers with the jelly plastic soles and carrying no rucksak. She was not too far up and not on a difficuld bit so I talked her down, It was easy really she just did not know what to do.
she soon managed the down climb once she knew to face
the rock and I helped her with where to put her feet. Once on the path she was at the bit where you could pick your way down round the scramle bits back to the road.

She did comment "you have done this before havent you?"

Now once I got her back on the path I asked her what on earth she was doing up there.

She said she had started out with her boyfriend but she got scared so he told her to go back down on her own and he would go to the top and meet her back in the car in an hour.

Ok so this guy is obviousley not an experienced fell walker/ scrambler. If he was he would firstly have never taken her up there dressed like that and secondly never left her when she got scared.

And he thinks he can climb the north ridge and decend then walk back along the road in an hour!! OK good luck mate.

Even if the cafe was still there, it would never have been open at that time of night to afford them any assistance.

If I remember rightly, isn't this in that age range and category that MRT said are more likely to want assistance?

Last year I came with my father and walked the Snowdon Ranger path to the top and about half way up we met two ladies (found out it was mother and daughter). They were fully dressed in paclite clothing and one had a small rucksack. Anyway when we got to the top and sat and had the obligatory coffee/tea and cake the daughter asked me "Whats the best way down?" I asked if she had a map to which she said no saying she had picked up the leaflet displayed in the youth hostel and they thought this would be a good walk.
Anyway I advised them of my intented route down and if they left before me I could see them and keep an eye out. Well we left about 20 minutes after and never saw them becoming worried. We arrived at the youth hostel and there was no sign but it turned out that they had decided in the good clear weather to wait a bit longer and had gone round the back to admire the views.

There are plenty of people out there that do things out of the ordinary but they think its alright - until they become stuck.

Fortunately my directions were good and they made it down safely, and we saw them walking along the road.(Some comfort)

I'd say exactly the same as Jules.

Im only 18, so wouldnt really be able to call myself and "experienced" walker, but I know I could descend the PYG track in the dark without much trouble. I have no idea why you'd start going up at that time in the evening without a torch though.

Ben I suspect you have a reasnoble degree of experience. At least enough to know what you do know and what you dont.

How long have you been at it?

When I was your age I had 10 years experience of fell walking ( and 5 years of more interesting stuff) which its lots more than some who call them selfs experienced. And no I wasent just plodding along behind the adults, I was navigating, route planning, back packing, scrambling. I did a 40 mile solo hike when I was 12 just for the challange and I was fell running by the age of 13.

Then I discoverd Motor Bikes and never climbed another mountain till I was in my early 30s

I'm afraid it's always the same old story that hits the news, ill equipped, near death, and wearing jeans ;-)

We all see them on our days out, sometimes they listen to a word of advice and turn back, but unfortunately for every one that turns back hundreds still go up, most of the time they come back down okay but now and again they don't.

Shame!

I was up doing the Snowdon Horseshoe on easter monday and the weather was pretty misurable, raining and moderately windy. Crossing crib goch there were people taking little gils of about 9 years old crying in terror (though it was too foggy to see jsut how high they were, luckaly for them I think!), and once we got onto the more popular llanberis path near the summit there were dozens of people in their jeans, someone had a fur coat, another was wearing a funny shaped bin bag as a coat, and for those of us that were prepared, were all in full waterproofs, and these pillocks were in jeans and fur coats! Its shoking how the MRT dont get more call out really.

You learn from experience and we've all been a numpty at some point in life and learned from the experience. I certainly have had my moments but I learned from them. Now I am an experienced walker, however it doesn't make me feel the need to go slagging everyone else off who's just starting out or learning, maybe everyone should get off there high and mighty cairns when it comes to commenting on these situations.

There is a difference between making mistakes and been a complete twit.

All of us have made errors of judgement but at least we made some sort of judgement to start with.

There seams to be no thought what so ever behind the actions of these people.

And we all stick a quid or two in the local MRT box when ever we pass one. Do you thind that the jeans and trainers brigade do? Do they even know its not publicly funded.

Do you really think that leaving a scared totaly inexperienced girlfriend to find her own way down a scramble is a mistake or just selfishness?

Now at the end of the day when I come across these people in trouble I help them if they ask, but you cant expect people not to discuss what they have seen. No one is condemming the individuals, just their actions.

You dont need to know anyting about fell walking to know that carrying on and on up a mountain with no torches as its gets darker and darker is down right silly.

Just to stir things up a little and to quell our natural tendency for self-righteous indignation...do you think the mountain rescue services should be ringfenced for serious, well equiped walkers (nay... alpiniste!) who get into trouble on the hill? No personal abuse please I'm just feeling that way out tonight.

NO dont be silly. The MRT like the NHS "Should" be free at the point of need.

I was just pointing out that (for the most part) Its us that are paying.

And anyone who thinks that discussing this issue is self-righteous indignation then tell me that you have never seen bad driving and commented on it??

What every one wants, and this is why the MRT publish these events is to encourage everyone to enjoy the mountains in relative safety.

We dont want to stop these guys climbing Snowdon, we want them to leave enough daylight, carry food and waterproofs and wear sensible clothes and footwear.

We want people to understand whats involved and what the dangers are.

When I have seen people in troube I have not wandered off with self-righteous indignation saying to my self serves them right I have helped them, we all do.

I often give a little friendly advice such as " this page you have cut out of Trail magazine is really just route suggestion not really meant for navigation, you should have a map and compass, espacially in this mist"


I try and be a friendly as I can cos I know thats the best way to persuade them to take the advice. I want them to do that because I want them to be a bit safer and not get lost again.

But, to expect the outdoors community not to come back with their " you wont believe what I saw on the hill today" stories is just not human nature.

We have all done it weather its about other peoples driving or some guys attitude to Health & Safety at work or the Scary belaying technique the womman at the bottom of the next route on the crag had.

One of the unfortunate side effects i found when i joined MR was how my attitude to others changed slightly. I find that i can't switch off really, and every person i pass, i take a sly look at how they are equipped etc.

I don't stop and tell people that they are ill-equipped, but i do sometimes make more of an effort to strike up a conversation with some. That way you can discover whether they are a seasoned hill bod who just happens to be wearing jeans today for some reason, or if they are about to get themselves into a bit of bother.

MR are making a concerted effort to raise awareness of how MR is funded in England and Wales, and also about how it works. Hopefully this will trickle down to the less hill-aware people who go out every now and again.

Jules is right about how we react to/comment on other people. It's human nature, and is a healthy thing to do. It's not just daytrippers heading up Snowdon/Scafell/The Ben who are capable of daft activity! I've seen/been with plenty of 'seasoned' people who've been arsing around at the bottom of crags, forgotten key safety items, made silly errors. It's just what people do, so commenting on another person's technique or judgement after the event is good, so long as it's done in a healthy way...

I have to agree with you Richard, my attitude became a little less "tolerant" of the "silly" element when I started my MRT training all those years ago.

I do wonder if some MRT's are considering the "right" approach at times though.

The "less experienced" public do need educating. They do need to be told of the dangers of being ill equipped and ill prepared for the less populated areas.

Beyond that, I think that the MRT pubicity machine needs to steer well clear of the politics, particularly regarding funding. Better in my view to remind such people that the "work" that MRT do is voluntary, and people MUST consider that they might be risking other people's lives as well as their own.

I think that a professional MRT would make the situation MUCH worse. People would become complacent and think that they have every right to be "stupid" as there are professionals PAID to bail them out!

Jules, Ive been on walking holidays to the Lakes with my parents all my life, but started taking it all more seriously when I joined Scouts at age 10. At 13 I did my first 3-day backpacking expedition in the Peak District (we had to route plan and walk alone all day) and we started doing a few days of more adventurous rough camping (guided by MLs) in the Lakes or Wales. I remember being about 13 when a group of us got lost on Bleaklow in fog, I also remember that we had the brains to eventually work out approximately where we were and to know that by walking uphill on a certain bearing we would hit a fence line. I think I was 14 when I did my first 3 day wild camp expedition in the Lake District, and our MLs made sure that we had a go at some micro-nav and night nav over the 3 days. After that our Leaders got more and more enthusiastic about teaching us micro-navigation, which whether or not you choose to always use it on the hill, definitely makes you respect the map a bit more. I left Scouts last summer, and now walk with a uni club (where I often get thrown the map...). Im out every other week in the Lakes, Snowdonia or the Western Highlands, have completed a Winter Skills course, and use my free weekends to escape to the Yorkshire Dales, but still have plenty to learn.

So that's what I'm talking about if I say i'm confident enough to walk the Pyg track at night. It baffles me as to why those people thought they might be able to do it and get down with reasonable light, without a torch.

Recently I walked with a different uni club (a more tame club) and they impose a rather strict heirarchy on their walks: "This person is leading, you guys follow in silence". The group leader led a group of 16, some fairly well prepared, others wearing jeans, trainers and with no waterproof coats on a 12 mile walk in horrendous weather from Asygarth. I appealed to the leader to cut the walk short as some of the girls were absolutely wet through and cold but he was of the opinion that it's their own fault and that he was going to finish the walk. After that I hung back to make sure the stragglers didn't get lost, and offered out my spare gloves (saving my spare fleece to offer to somebody when we got to the dry bus). In this situation I couldn't work out who was more silly, the ill-prepared girls, or the group leader who carried on trekking.

I once met 2 guys on top of Ben Oss near Tyndrum in February a few years ago. Despite full snow coverage they were dressed in 'street' clothes. Suit jacket, casual trousers, leather dress shoes, the works! After mentioning to them that they might be ill equipped for winter hillwalking they replied that they had went for a walk as their wives were having a lie in.(They were staying in a guest house in the area)It was a beautiful sunny winters day.After wishing them luck i glissaded(ok, slid on my arse!)most of the way back down using my axe to brake. I looked back up and saw this figure hurtling towards me somersaulting completely out of control. The speed he was going at was amazing! He dissapeared over a ramp and then there was silence.I hurried down expecting the worse and saw a prone figure several 100 metres below me. As i made my way to him he got to his feet and noticed he was virtually naked. The friction of his tumbling fall had shredded most of his clothes.The slope was full of rocky outcrops and he had managed to avoid every one.He looked so ridiculous that i just burst out laughing.I asked him what had happened and he said that after i left him on the summit he thought that me glissading looked fun and gave it a go himself. I asked him what he was expecting to brake with and he just shrugged his shoulders.I'll bet that guy doesn't realise how close he came to being a statistic. These were no kids but two men in their 50's!

That club doesn't sound like much fun... bet those girls lose interest pretty quickly. That 'leader' sounds thoughtless to say the least.

With people in general, I don't find it surprising that they might think "Well if there's a railway up there and a cafe at the top it can't be that hard." With easy access to a lot of summits it's likely that there will always be a significant element who underestimate the conditions they might find and the effort required. Not sure what a solution might be.

"solution" is the key to a lot of these problems with peoples lack of education and knowledge. I remember two years ago at the Ben Nevis Info Centre they were trying out a sign post and vital info boards thing where people who were starting off to go up the Tourist Path could see a few sign posts asking wether they had certain kit etc and giving out free guides? Its a very good idea, obviously not on 97% of mountain routes but on the popular ones like Snowdon why not give people more info at the start of the paths, clear and in obvious places?

We shouldn't be slaggin anyone off for there lack of eucation or knowledge but looking for a solution to better there knowledge to save everyone time and money and allow them to have a better mountain experience. I don't like negative attitudes towards people trying to get into the outdoors and think we should educate instead of discouraging or slagging off.

Ben You are more experienced than many 30 somethings who consider themselfs so.

But you do also appear to have a sensible attitude to the hills and you dont seam to over estimate you abilities.

I also have walkes with a tame walking group with my mum and they had rules about what you wore and what you carried. OK no one searched you rucksac but you would not have been alowed with the group wearing jeans.

If the walk leader saw himself as in charge the girls should have been properly advised before they turned up not left to suffer when it was too late..

That club doesn't sound like much fun... bet those girls lose interest pretty quickly. That 'leader' sounds thoughtless to say the least.

I've personally never liked walking in groups that large anyway - I think the biggest group I've ever walked with was only about 6 strong and more often I'm by myself or with one or two others.

I've done close to 60 munros and lots of other walking however I still regard myself as close to a beginner, mainly because I've got very limited winter experience on anything much bigger than the Pentlands. That (plus the fact that I'm often out alone) means I try to be careful with route choice and I'm quite happy to cancel a planned day out if the conditions are looking problematic.

My ultimate Idea of "experienced" is some one who knows what they know and knows what they dont know.

Easier said than done.

There is always something to learn even if your name is Alan Hinks.