We take a nostalgic look back at 2003 and the outdoors stories and features that made the news what it was on OUTDOORSmagic
Wow, another year draws to a cliched close - sorry, but the old
ones are the best - so we thought we'd take a traditional look back
at 2003 and what happened in the outdoors and, more specifically on
OUTDOORSmagic.
Obviously there was the triumph of Jonny Wilkinson scaling
Everest by the Kangshung Face, but what else happened?
Here's part one of our review of 2003 - January to June - part two
coming soon...
Well,
January started in ominous fashion with the news that AE
Wainwright's books were about to
be axed,
though as we know now, a new publisher soon stepped into the breach,
or should that be breeches?
Closer to home, the OM editor discovered a new
8000-metre peak the hitherto unknown Khatsti Khan, a British
climber crawled
for four days after falling down a Romanian mountain and the
month ended on an optimistic note with the news of a ceasefire
between Maoist insurgents and the government in Nepal. Shame it
didn't last.
Top Features...
Your 2003
outdoor stars with the Mystic Mouflon, did they work for you?
Plus some great snowy
pics from Helvellyn with white-tinted views of Striding Edge to
whet your appetite for winter.
Plus check out the mountain
web cams page which we invented just one year ago.
February
was a shorter month, erm, and kicked off with us running a daft
story about Britain's mountains being closed after a
rambler
jacknifed on the lower slopes of Helvellyn... Hmmm, what was that
all about then?
More usefully, the Wainwright guidebooks were saved after London
publisher Francis Lincoln stepped
into the great man's breeches (sorry, that's the last mention for
that particular joke). We brought you exclusive extracts from Nicolas
van Hoogstraten's new
prison book and the disputed path across his estate was bull-dozed
open to RA glee.
The month ended on a sad note however, with the news that
Chris
Brasher, the man behind The Brasher Boot Company, had died.
Top Features...
We tested waterproof,
breathable fabrics back to back in real conditions to see which
breathed best, revived the OM
Leurve Test for Valentine's Day and carried some top
tips on agility from the Butcher's Dog.
And then
it was
March with the hunt on for the
'Face
of Rohan'... That's the travel clothing company rather than the
comedian by the way. We scooped the world with the first pics of
Petzl's
new Myo head torch, the ones we weren't allowed to show you...
Meanwhile, in a shock announcement,
Lowe
Alpine revealed that it would be abandoning eVENT and Triple
Point Ceramic in favour of Gore-Tex from winter 2004... Cue much
gnashing of forum teeth.
More gnashing of teeth in Snowdonia where the controversial
Green
Key Project controverisially 'lived on' according to an official
statement anyway... Finally the month ended with our first
news of the new Touching The Void film being in production after
two years of filming, seems a long time ago now :-) And the Lancashire
moors caught fire, in March? Surely some mishtake...
Top Features...
Scoop report from the Outdoors
Show in Brumm plus we topped off the month with a candid
interview with top Brit Himalayan man Alan
Hinkes on life, the 8000s, fear and everything.
Ahhh...
April and it all kicked off on April 1 with the scoop
revelation that a Welsh farmer had
bequeathed
his entire farm to a flock of badger-faced sheep... Fishy, but
some of you still fell for it....
Alan Hinkes set off to attempt
Kangchenjunga and sent us some of his famed atavistic, primitive
artwork for the site, meanwhile Brian
Blessed supported a scheme to introduce more ehtnic minorities to
the outdoors and kicked off a lively forum debate in the process...
'I've never met an Albanian climber on the hill' etc, etc...
Easter
fires devestated parts of the Peak District, as the dry spell
continued and there was bad
news for Hinkesy, who was forced back to Kathmandu after
developing a serious bronchial infection during the walk-in to
Kangchenjunga. He actually called
us from Nepal with the news, so he still has two peaks to go in
his quest to become the first Brit to scale all the 8000-ers.
Everest got its own internet
caff and blog too and, erm, that was it really.
Top Features...
We
backpacked with a day sac to see how easy it is to go
ultra-lightweight, gave our verdict
on eVENT and took some nice pics of the Dark
Side of Kinder.
May's
maddest story was the American climber
Aron
Ralston who hacked off his own arm with a multi-tool after
becoming trapped by a boulder... Scarcely seems believable even
now.
Meanwhile, OM regular Guy Newbold started
an online diary charting the effects of Three Peaks Challenge
walkers on the remote Wasdale Valley where he works. The issue
started some heated debates and opened a few eyes along the way.
We ripped the piss out of a GPS-equipped
shopping trolley with a superb scoop pic of how it might look and
the 50th Anniversary of the first ascent of Everest took over the
world. We joined in with a comprehensive 'E
for Everest' feature collecting all the best information from the
web and elsewhere in one place....
The Chinese pipped everyone else to the top of the Big E, with
live
TV pictures from the summit to spice things up, then there were
speed records, age records, number records, but hey, enough Everest
already...
Closer to home, the new Hadrian's
Wall path officially opened. Nice. And then there was, erm, more
Everest stuff.... Noooo....
Top Features...
Grangers showed us round their beautiful house and gave us some
top
tips on outdoors clothing care along the way.
June,
remember summer? Veteran explorere and adventure racer
Rannulf
Fiennes collapsed with heart problems, which makes his recent
marathon running feats even more incredible. Did you realise it was
that recent?
We had an OM
Meet-Up in the Duddon Valley and discovered our new best friend,
a web site dedicated to the celebration of the pleasures of
tea and biscuits. Nice. And who said it was a slow news day? We
also explained how to open
a Petzl Myo battery box... And yes, it needed to be
explained.
The Naked Rambler made his first
appearance on OM, with the news that he'd been arrested in
Cornwall. Little did we know then how big he'd become, ahem... Sorry.
June was also the month when we uncovered one of our favourite
stories of the year with the discovery of the strangely
familiar JuanKing World... It's still there, it's still familiar
and it's still one of the funniest things we've seen for ages. It's
okay Juan, we still won't sue you...
And if you're still bored, check out the Rockface
game. Hours of fun for the terminally tired of reality. Whatever
happened to Rockface anyway? Annie, we're going to miss you. And the
one who looked like Robbie Williams too. Ahem...
And that's it for part one, part two - July-December - coming
soon....
