Bernadette McDonald's 'Freedom Climbers' wins Boardman-Tasker

Canadian writer,Bernadette McDonald has been announced as the 2011 winner of the Boardman-Tasker award for mountain literature. Her book 'Freedom Climbers' recently walked of with the prestigious Grand Prize at the Banff Mountain Book Festival.

Bernadette McDonald's book, published by Rocky Mountain Books in October 2011, gives an account of the bravery and dedication of Polish climbers and their race for Himalayan peaks in the 1980s. McDonald puts forth the theory that the difficult conditions that martial law imposed on Polish society charged these climbers with the resilience to be the best in the world.

The book recreates the challenges that Polish climbers faced in pursuing their sky-high goals, detailing Voytek Kurtyka's remarkable conquest of Gasherbrum IV and Wanda Rutkiewicz's pioneer ascent of K2 as the first woman to do so in history, along with the personal stories of their friends and colleagues, many of whom perished in the punishing conditions of winter in the Himalayas.

Bernadette is the founding vice-president of Mountain Culture at the Banff Centre and the author of seven books on international mountaineering. She is the winner of numerous awards including the Alberta Order of Excellence, the Summit of Excellence Award from the Banff Centre, the King Albert Award for international leadership in the field of mountain culture and environment, and the Queen’s Golden Jubilee Medal.

Here there be dragons: The Long Hope Climb review

And so it begins...It is 1970,  'the greatest decade the world has ever witnessed has ended and we have patently failed to paint it black'. Ed Drummond  who was busy making a name for himself with daring ascents in Avon and Wales, had persuaded fellow Bristol graduate Oliver Hill to join him on a climb which would cement his reputation as a pioneer par excellence. The destination-St John's Head on the wind wracked edge of Orkney.

A cliff which the pioneers described as 'like the prow of the SS Great Britain', cutting through the Atlantic breakers. The 500 metre route would take the challenge of the prow head on. Deviously twisting through loose, overhanging terrain with the added insecurity-weather issues aside- of puking fulmers disgorging their foul brew in the direction of any passing creature !

The ascent has 'epic' carved deeply into the blood red stone. Drummond and Hill's ascent over several days was unheard of at the time. A route of Alpine proportions involving technical climbing at the cutting edge of the era. Although it was a mixed aid route-the climb involved free climbing at up to E5 standard- given it's location and lack of escape or rescue potential, the climb became the stuff of nightmares for its ascentionists. Writing of the ascent, Ed Drummond described being visited by demons and ghosts as he climbed through fear and fatigue. Nearing the end of the route-and his sanity- he describes retreating in terror from one of the penultimate pitches and being assailed by an almost physical malevolent presence.   " Who are you..what do you want from me?'

At this stage he asked himself 'am I committing climbing suicide?'. For his dogged partner Oliver Hill... ' I was there to prussik up the rope and take out the pegs'... it would take the wind out of his climbing sails for several years,such was the psychological impact. Twenty seven years later,the route was freed - by English climbers John Arran and Dave Turnbull. 'Freed'...well not exactly for Arran and Turnbull took a sideline which avoided the crux and which Hill,with an uncanny photographic memory-had detailed in a pin point topo which he had sent to the 97 team.

Thirteen years on and enter Scotland's golden boy and possibly the UK's greatest all round climber Dave Macleod with trusty sidekick Andy Turner reprising the Oliver Hill role. Unlike the Drummond/Hill and Arran/Turnbull ascents which relied on grainy out of focus self taken shots and wobbly cine8 images to record the occasion, the Macleod/Turner team had  in harness the formidable creative unit that is the Hot Aches Crew who with acclaimed photographer Lucasz Warzecha, set out to record the event. An event which has evolved into the much anticipated latest Hot Aches flic..The Long Hope. A film which will receive it's world premier at the Kendal Mountaineering Festival this week.

The climb itself has been discussed at length in the climbing media so no need to give a blow by blow account of the climb itself. However,to get straight to the heart of the film itself, I have to say from the outset that the work is a stunning success ! Like the previously acclaimed Hot Aches production The Pinnacle- which featured the same Macleod/Turner team in their assault on the Marshall/Smith winter routes from 'one memorable week' in the early sixties- The Long Hope succeeds, not because of the drama of Dave Macleod pushing the envelope to the limit, Although there is plenty of sweaty palm moments throughout the sixty minutes running time. It works so well because it is so intelligently structured. Interspersing historical footage,stills,
interviews and narrative with contemporary events.

Rather than getting the Drummond/ Hill stuff out of the way and concentrating on Dave Mac flexing his abs on the 2011 route- Ed Drummond especially, is an engaging and overarching presence throughout the film.And so he should be of course, because after all, The Long Hope was his created from his raw ambition and vision. Albeit at times a demonic vision.

The contrast between Ed Drummond and Dave Macleod is a fascinating one indeed. Very much a case of Ed Drummond being the dark Yin to Dave Mac's  lighter yang. Drummond the wild performance poet,crouched simian like atop a scaffold tower.
Hurling obscure poetic visions at his perplexed and frightened audience. The political activist and idealist who saw his life fall apart in the 1980's. Recorded in gruesome detail in a BBC documentary.

Dave Macleod by contrast is very much the modern rock athlete. A man of steely single minded determination. Dedicated,committed and every inch a lean mean climbing machine. He may not go around saying 'my body is a temple' but it clearly is!  However, he is also a man who comes across as affable and approachable.
Someone the average climber could well imagine sharing a pint and an anecdote with in the Clachaig.

On the route itself,Dave offers the following information for those who fancy a crack at the route. 'You have to climb totally on balance. You can't afford to pull up on the holds' such is their fragility. The final crux pitches are totally compelling in their intensity. Like an all action film hero who just comes out gun blazing,Mac just ploughs on,and on,and on... with each move appearing ever more tenuous than the last. 'Surely not..how can he do that..he must be off..no...what the !!!

For the average climber gripping the edge of their seat, this is the stuff of dreams...and nightmares! The stream of expletives rattles out like machine gun fire as the bold Scot powers up the mind blowing face with the rasping waves far below. Simply watching this section is exhausting!

Graciously, Dave Macleod never falters in his praise for Drummond who with the rudimentary gear of the time and climbing into the unknown, achieved something equally magnificent. In truth the wild poet has mellowed these days into a wise and philosophical sage. Physically burdened by Parkinson disease since it was diagnosed in 1993. Drummond came over during the filming to be interviewed and come to terms with the climb which had nearly broken him physically and mentally.

In one poignant scene,he returns to a stone pillar above St John's Head and carefully scrapes away the luxuriant green lichen which had taken hold, Revealing the initials ED and OH carved into the stone 40 years ago. Despite the vicissitudes of a life lived less ordinary, Ed reveals he can only feel blessed as the days grow shorter,for the extraordinary experiences and relationships he has enjoyed in his extraordinary life For Dave Macleod..and Andy Turner...new horizons still beckon.

As I write,the film has yet to hit the mountaineering film festivals or gain general release. I can only reaffirm,this is a brilliant and imaginative piece of work which I feel may well be seen as something of a classic within the genre in future years. Enjoy...but make sure you have some finger nails to gnaw on first!

Extras include... Return to the Indian Face: 50 years in the mountains: Mucklehouse Wall: The Old Man of Hoy.

The Long Hope is soon to be available from Hot Aches

John Appleby: 2011

The times they are a changing.

In the two years since Footless Crow crawled out of the ether; the site has consistently offered a new article each week from a
rock climbing, mountaineering or environmental perspective. The mixture of both republished and new articles has been relatively popular in terms of page visits, drawing a small but steadily growing audience.

I have been delighted to have received the support of many of the UK's best outdoor writers and photographers who have offered both new material and permission to republish their old articles in this new format.  Just over twelve months ago.I added a linked page To Hatch a Crow  which originally was intended to compliment the main site with news and reviews from the world of mountaineering and environmentalism.

Surprisingly perhaps,the Crow's fledgling site draws around three times as many visitors as the main site.Proving perhaps,that readers are more interested in a more consistently rolling agenda of new material than the more structured format of longer articles on Footless Crow. With this in mind, Footless Crow in future will now carry both articles and news and reviews which will be updated more regularly, with articles still carrying trailers but with shorter features complimenting the main material. I hope this revamp doesn't upset or put off the regular readers as it's intended to pep up the site and draw in new readers.

Not surprisingly for a UK site based in North Wales,the majority of those dropping in are from the UK but as many of a third of page visits are from the United States.With this in mind,US mountaineering news will compliment the UK stuff as it has on THAC.
To Hatch a Crow will now concentrate more on environmental news from around the world although news from wider world of mountain activities will still feature. Thanks for looking in and hope you like the new format.

Alfred Wainwright: Fool on the Hill?

It is twenty years since 'the greatest fellwalker', AW Wainwright was cast to the fell winds atop Haystacks above Buttermere. In the intervening years, the iconic image of the avuncular, flat capped, bluff Lancastrian with a smouldering pipe firmly fixed in a jowly jaw, has remained constantly in the public eye.

Indeed, in the years since Wainwrights death there is no sign that 'The Wainwright industry' is grinding to a halt. Each year sees a fresh batch of glossy coffee table tomes re-printed, New updated versions of his pictorial guides dispatched. Ditto desk diaries,address books,walkers notebooks,caledars,DVD's etc

However,despite the general hagiographic treatment of Wainwright the man and his work from the media-Think Julia Bradbury traipsing around the Lakeland Fells in BBC's 'Wainwrights Walks', quoting at length from one of his pictorial guides as if AW was Rabindranath Tagore! - the Fellsman has seen dark clouds gather over his snow capped reputation.Hunter Davies' 2002 biography of Wainwright, brought into the public domain some less than attractive elements of the man's life and character. Despite Hunter's sensitivity in dealing with the less savoury parts of his subjects' character. Enough information came out both in his book and in contemporary articles by other writers to suggest that Wainwright was actually was not the lovable curmudgeonly eccentric beloved of Daily Mail readers and BBC presenters but was in fact, something of a dark,egotistical and self centred individual that most people would cross the street to avoid!

Not surprisingly though when dealing with iconic cultural figures like AW,nothing is quite as it seems and in truth,the heart of the AW enigma lies somewhere between the two extremes. So...as AW himself would say in his Lancashire drawl..let's get down to brass tacks.

I must hasten now to the Scafells.noblest of Lakeland's cathedrals,while good health and appreciation of beauty and simple reverence and gratitude remain with me. For when I have lost these blessings I shall have little left.

Alfred Wainwright...the history bit.

AW was born in Blackburn Lancashire in 1907. Yes US readers...the one with four thousand holes in it! Born into a working class family to a rather unpleasant alcoholic father with violent tendencies and a demur saintly mother who bore the brunt of Thomas Wainwright's boorish and unpredictable behaviour. In common with most working class children of the day, AW was destined for a life in one of the town's many cotton mills but his academic prowess proved to be a defining and redeeming feature of his early life and he managed to escape the clutches of the mill owners for a life of white shirt and tie accountancy in the service of local authorities.
After passing his accountancy exams and climbing the town hall career ladder. Wainwright began to while away the quieter moments with doodling and calligraphy experiments. Developing a reasonable degree of competency in cartoon drawing and cartography.  Indeed Wainwright had developed his passion for maps in childhood. Spending hours studying existing maps and designing his own. Created to detail  imaginary locations where his creative  young mind had led him.

A holiday excursion to the English Lake District with a cousin-Eric Beardsall from his Blackburn home in 1930 proved to be a revelationary experience for AW. Together they climbed modest Orrest Head and the experience proved to be the catalyst which ignited his lifelong religious passion and fervour for the fells of Westmorland,Cumberland and Lancashire.

In 1931 Wainwright had married local mill girl Ruth Holden in Blackburn, with whom he had one son. It quickly became apparent that the upwardly mobile AW felt he had made a terrible mistake and had married someone with whom he had nothing in common. It grew into a quite frankly horrible loveless relationship with both parties held within a iron maw of contemporary social mores. In 1941 the Wainwrights upped sticks and moved to Kendal where he had gained a position in the local authority. Eventually becoming Borough Treasurer,a position he held until retirement in 1967.

During his time in Cumbria and partly to escape to from his tragic  relationship
Wainwright began his transformation from Fell Wanderer into Fell chronicler. What had been originally intended as a comprehensive journal evolved into the classic series of pictorial guides which AW began in earnest in 1952. Completing the 7 volume series in 1964....one week ahead of his 13 year schedule!

The probability is that the books will progressively be withdrawn from publication after a currency of a few years

After divorcing Ruth Holden in the late 60's he married long term 'girlfriend' Betty McNally in 1970 and remained with her in the Kendal home he previously shared with Ruth Holden until his death in Kendal in 1991.

Following retirement Wainwright devoted more time to his writing career and as his popularity and appeal took off,began to produce a series of works including glossy coffee table works in collaboration with photographers like Derry Brabbs. In the late 80's Wainwright star had risen to the extent that television producers had beaten a path to his door and persuaded him to take part in fell walking TV programmes with friend and Cumbrian resident,Eric Robson. In this post retirement phase,Wainwright had also written a guidebook to the popular Pennine Way and created a long distance walk of his own. The Coast to Coast walk across Northern England between St Bees in Cumbria to picturesque Robin Hood Bay on the North Yorkshire coast.

We shouldn't forget Wainwrights passion for animals and football! AW was a founder member of his home town Blackburn Rovers Supporters Club and established an animal sanctuary in Cumbria to which he is estimated to have given over a million pounds in his lifetime.



WAINWRIGHT-SAINT OR SINNER?: The Case for the prosecution.

For anyone writing about Alfred Wainwright the man,from a liberal 'right on' perspective it is hard to know where to begin! Here was a man who according to friends was a boorish hang-em flog em conservative. A Tweedy old fashioned curmudgeon who had a seedy dirty raincoat, misogynistic view of women. Witness some rather sad sexualised cartoons which survive from his  Blackburn council days. A man who treated his first wife appallingly. A relationship which was unremittingly cold, emotionally cruel and abusive. A man who left his one and only child out of his will, despite the fact that his son was at the time of his death,suffering from a severe arthritic condition which had forced his early retirement. This despite the fact that Wainwright was a millionaire at the time of his death who had bequeathed a small fortune to animal charities.

As a person, Wainwright could be described as socially autistic. His wanderings in the fells were inevitably solo affairs as he couldn't stand most people and their idle chit chat. Living by Pascal's advice 'the more I see of humanity the more I love my dog'! He had the reputation of treating the approach of a well-wisher as the signal to turn his back and go through the pretence of urinating. Strangely those outstretched hands of his admirers were quickly withdrawn!
From an environmental perspective. It is argued that his pictorial guides and coffee table works helped to popularise and vulgarise the fells which he claimed to hold in religious reverence. In the lingua franca of the era, quite a cad and something of  a hypocrite wouldn't you say?  However, at this point, his legions of admirers may well chime ' cool your boots man....I think you'll find that old Alfred was a bit more 'right on'  than you give him credit for!'

ALFRED THE GREAT: The case for the defence.

Alfred Wainwright might well have been socially autistic,politically reactionary and emotionally selfish but then again,many well regarded creatives from Karl Marx to John Lennon....Ernest Hemingway to Picasso- carried within themselves some pretty heavy personal baggage. He might have been someone you would wish to avoid at all costs but surprisingly,in many ways, elements of his life and personal philosophy could be seen as progressive and enlightened. For example,Wainwright was very much the proto environmentalist; Railing in print against ecologically insensitive developments such as the destruction of the exquisite valley of Mardale in the north Lakes to create a reservoir to supply water to urban Manchester.  Think Capel Celyn in North Wales or US readers think Hetch Hetchy California.

But man works with such clumsy hands; gone forever are the quiet bays and shining shores that nature had fashioned so sweetly

Further environmental misgivings were expressed regarding the coniferous afforestation of Ennerdale and the construction of the A66 highway between Penrith and Keswick in Cumbria. The current encroachment of huge wind farms in Cumbria would have driven him to apoplexy! A development which couldn't fail to lambast in print.

Given his quasi religious appreciation of the northern fells, it is appropriate that Wainwright's carbon footprint -a term he would have snorted at- was minimal. As a non driver all his life,AW's excursions into the fells were overwhelmingly carried out by using public transport. Planning his trips meticulously. Aiming to return from the fells in time to catch the bus home and hopefully, in time to snatch a fish and chip supper!

All my walks during the past two years have ended at Keswick Bus Station

As a fell wanderer,Wainwright was the antithesis of the modern day walker. Eschewing the expensive 'must have' outdoor fashions which modern outdoor magazines-driven by the advertisers-convince their more gullible readers they really MUST purchase if they want to go hill walking. You wouldn't find Wainwright waiting for a bus in Keswick wearing the latest Gore-Tex kag, trendy Lowe-Alpine hat with his size tens slipped into a pair of £300 boots! AW somehow managed to roam far and wide over the fells in attire which modern walkers would find more suitable for a walk in the park!  Ironic that someone proclaimed by the outdoor media as 'the greatest fellwalker' was a million times removed from their commercial agenda.

Wainwright has been criticized for his philanthropy towards animal welfare charities rather than supporting 'people charities'...poverty, child welfare, help the aged etc. However, surely in any civilised society it is incumbent on the state to look after its citizens. After all, it is a Victorian concept that the weak and vulnerable should be at the mercy of charitable institutions. With animal welfare off the state's agenda then this area by contrast is very much the concern of charities and individual philanthropists like Wainwright.

One of the most appealing elements of Wainwrights character was his modesty and his indifference to the wealth he had accumulated as his career really took off and his books began to sell in their hundreds of thousands. There was nothing ostentatious about AW. Indeed,it appeared that he had little regard for material possessions at all, preferring to distribute his wealth through his charitable donations or indeed,through benevolent contributions to friends and collaborators.

Wainwright may not be considered as an outdoor sage in the manner of a WH Murray,an Edward Abbey or a Aldo Leopold but he sprinkled his pictorial guides with poetic musings on the spiritual elements which infused the fells and the act of fell walking.

In the north country parlance..'there's nowt as queer as folk'. Alfred Wainwright was a queer eel to be sure, but his pictorial guides can be seen as one of the great achievements in the field of outdoor literature. Every page hand crafted in loving detail and offered as  his' love letter to the fells' . Destined to remain forever unfashionably fashionable, Wainwright's works will undoubtedly continue to be read and appreciated long after many current well regarded outdoor writer's works have been consigned to the bargain bin or charity shop.


I had escaped from the disappointments and unkindnesses of life and emerged above them into a new a better world

John Appleby 2011

This Week: Alfred Wainwright....True North.

"I might have been the last man in a dead world" AW


"It is twenty years since 'the greatest fellwalker' , AW Wainwright was cast to the fell winds atop Haystacks above Buttermere. In the intervening years, the iconic image of the avuncular, flat capped, bluff Lancastrian with a smouldering pipe firmly fixed in a jowly jaw, has remained constantly in the public eye.

Indeed in the years since Wainwrights death there is no sign that 'The Wainwright industry' is grinding to a halt. Indeed,each year sees a fresh batch of glossy coffee table Wainwright tomes re-printed, New updated versions of his pictorial guides, ditto desk diaries,address books,walkers notebooks,calendars dvd's etc.

However,despite the general hagiographic treatment of Wainwright the man and his work from the media- Think Julia Bradbury traipsing around the Lakeland Fells in BBC's 'Wainwrights Walks', quoting at length from one of his pictorial guides as if AW was Rabindranath Tagore- Hunter Davies' 2002 biography of Wainwright, brought into the public domain some less than attractive elements of the man's life and  character

Despite Hunter's sensitivity in dealing with the less savoury parts of his subjects' character, enough information came out both in his book and in contemporary articles by other writers to suggest that Alfred Wainwright was actually was not the loveable curmudgeonly eccentric beloved of Daily Mail readers and BBC presenters but was in fact, something of a dark,egotistical and self centred individual that most people would cross the street to avoid!

 Not surprisingly though when dealing with iconic cultural figures like AW, nothing is quite as it seems and in truth,the heart of the AW enigma lies somewhere between the two extremes. So...as AW himself would say in his Lancashire drawl..let's get down to brass tacks. '

This week,twenty years after his death in 1991, John Appleby takes a warts and all look at Alfred Wainwright- the man and his legacy. Despite disturbing more than a few skeletons in Wainwright's closet,the author finds much to admire in 'the greatest fellwalker' .

Sacred Ground

John Redhead













Browsed to the Bone

Hill farming has always been seen as a joke and annoyance by those using the hill recreationally. The farmers were treated with ridicule and flippancy when accosted by them on the hill. I was once stepping over a stile with my dog on a lead, on my way to climb a route on Tryfan, when a farmer approached me and said he wanted the dog off his land. A scrawled sign on the gate said, Dogs on a Lead. I asked him if he could read English and carried on. He persisted aggressively with his demands. I refused, saying I was on a designated footpath within the National Park and what right had he got to harass me? He came at me to fight! I pushed him away and his glasses fell to the ground, breaking a lens. He was in rage. He went into his house nearby and came out with a twelve bore shotgun. He raised it up and pointed it at me, at which his wife threw herself out of the house screaming at him in Welsh. She stood between me and the gun. It was a nasty scene. A twitch away from News at Ten. Ugly. He backed off shaking in a mess of a man. I actually felt sorry for him. The old boy should be hanging out with girls in grass skirts swinging his hips to some samba rift on a Caribbean island, pissed up on coconut cocktails! Why is the land such a burden to these people? Is this due to the conflicts and restraints of a hard life fighting nature and resenting those enjoying it? I shouldn’t feel sorry for being free in the land. You shouldn’t get used to this aggression.

Another ‘diverse hill farming character’ that is allowed to farm sheep on Snowdon aggressively jumped up and down on a friend’s parapente chute after he had landed on the flanks of Snowdon. Causing a lot of damage to the fabric of the chute, he gave him a mouthful of abuse about flying being unnatural and scaring the sheep! It was tragically comic! The incident was photographed. He came across as a lunatic! I know this man, he treats ravens and foxes with the same disrespect! The episodes of confrontation and abuse of rights from these people constitute a novel in its own right. There is a correlation between farmers, depression and shotguns and farming being the profession highest in the suicide stakes. Seems divine to me. That’s the land telling them! But part of me likes this old geezer! I like the energy of this old boy playing the game he knows and getting away with it. I once said to him that these hills need the trees and wildlife back and he replied, “You can plant as many trees as you want boy, fill it with what you want boy, but it will cost you. It will cost you a lot boy” It’s all about a commodity and spreadsheets to these folk.

The continuing damage caused by hill farming is a major consideration for the need for escape. I have taken the issues on board and can no longer see it as a joke. As a climber in the hills en-route to a climb it can be tolerated. It can be tolerated for entertainment value. As an intolerant bastard who doesn’t climb anymore and cannot ignore the damage it’s a ‘fuck up’! Groups like The Snowdonia Society patronize the ‘traditional’ upland sheep farmer by supporting so called 'thriving and cohesive' hill farming communities. They do not exist! It’s a con, make no mistake, it’s the tongue they are patronizing! Their lifestyle depends on subsidies with absolutely no economic benefit to the community at large! And you simply cannot reconcile ‘any’ upland farming methods and wildlife habitats. Further, there is no tradition of hill farming practices in North wales, unless you consider a 'tradition' within three hundred years. A 'true' tradition would be to leave the mountains alone and appreciate and respect them for what they are. Wilderness should be on the agenda. The last thing the hill farmer needs is more power! Or poetic accolade! Or even a house to live in! In protecting the tongue, The National Park supports terrorism against wildlife! An idiot with an aerosol can defacing a crag with graffiti does far less damage!


Subsequently, I can no longer venture into the so-called wilds of Snowdonia without feeling a sense of loss and sadness. The subsidized practice of sheep hill farming has browsed the mountain to the bone. I feel isolated. And as I feel in my own bones, the mountain is no longer sacred. My bones feel browsed out too. I have hunger for this ‘food’, this wilderness, this other. This is an important issue. I think the space that is wild nature is connected with the health of society and are we not all creatures within this space? To me this is ground zero, the all being source of life - a collective oneness. The man-made Gods breed a conquering of nature from the granite box down in the valley. These chapels are not lost in the landscape but scream, “Shit off nature.” The effort! To me they are symptomatic of the damage, symptomatic of the ‘pollution’. The wilderness has been traded for a cheap unnecessary commodity. It became personal. I could only focus on the damage, perhaps in the same way as focusing on the beauty of the city streets?

wilderness of the streets.

‘From my tree house studio in the centre of Liverpool, I survey the surrounding forest throwing up its sounds - the breaking of bottles, hideous screams and delirious shouts and the endless groaning of the dispossessed.’

This is another occasion when ‘real’ time caught up with me whilst cleaning the street outside my warehouse studio in Liverpool. It is also to do with an intervention and researching where you are, homes and letting go. These streets had become my purposeful nest built out on a limb and exposed. It could so easily be torn apart by the surrounding life-forms that charge about with different stories and other intent. I am reminded of the fragility and exposure that threaten the daily life of the inhabitants of hedgerows that my Grandfather showed me as a child. I don’t think I ever forgot the magic I felt in examining the nests and the eggs found in these hedgerows on our many walks. Regardless of the ‘art’, I think the interventions are somehow part of this childhood magic to examine and ponder the apparent fragility and wonder of life.

“With the town empty and splayed with the fresh droppings of the previous night, I brush the streets bordering my little patch. This patch has its reference point on a global grid within a mephitic network. I feel the patterns of this network radiating out from an insignificant crack at my feet in this Fleet Street pavement... the homeless emerge upon a morning of last night’s thrown away takeaways with the rats and pigeons... briefly they warm themselves at my urban bonfire... I hold my sweeping and gaze into the yellows and greens, blues and violets that set free the dense black clouds of smoke. I feel close to an envy? An envy of the homeless. An envy of their proximity to this speeding and of their carefree throwing and picking in the shade of consumer life - of their honest back to the bone, close to the life and death of whatever total wastedness and degeneracy is... much more than mere vagrancy in which I often see my future...

I met Peter Poetry in the street, enthusiastically eating a pizza that had been thrown on the pavement. Picking off ‘street bits’, he enquired as to my familiarity with Sartre! He was a large, erudite gentleman of the road who carried two plastic carrier bags full of books. These bags of books were his home. At that moment he was residing in an enclosed skip around the corner to my studio. He would be politely outraged if anyone threw rubbish into the skip whilst he was in residence, “I say, do you mind, I live here, I am trying to read!” His books kept his intellect ticking whilst the man disintegrated slowly from years of tragedy, pain and misfortune. We shared many a ‘coffee morning’ in the studio as I struggled to grasp the breadth of his intelligence…sharing his wisdom and his ‘big city’ trickster that kept him moving…

It was from my warehouse home here that my involvement with E9 6c was filmed and recorded. This happened within the last few weeks of my departure from this special perch. John Mortimer’s son, Jeremy, produced an excellent piece for Radio Three called, ‘Between the Ears’. Dominic Clemence produced and directed the film for BBC2. This was the attempted story of The Indian Face, a fierce route on the cathedral of rock, Clogwyn Du Arddu, on the flank of Snowdon. I liked the bit where I am sat under my climbing wall in the studio flippantly explaining the image I painted on the scar where the flake had been. This small granite flake had come away in my arms whilst testing the peg that had been smashed into its side. I drew a quick sketch on the wall of ‘the hunt‘, something that had stayed with me from viewing the Lascaux Caves in France. Only two people had seen it. Paul Williams had photographed it and Johnny Dawes had scraped it off (or rather, an acolyte had scraped it off). One had died and the other had seemingly gone mad!

 The late Paul Williams photograph of John Redhead's notorious Indian Face painting

I joke, but I had to get Johnny back in the script when he became defensive about my rant against top-roping. I stand by my argument that top-roping damages the rock! Bolt, peg, top-roping ego – damage done! The narrative needed his feedback and method of approach. It was important because it set the scene. My attempts on the line were foolish, naive and dangerously ‘pushed my luck’. His determination and intense, practiced approach won the day. I took a huge, very lucky fall. Warriors or not, I think we both enjoyed negotiating with our lives in our own way. Perhaps the rock was secondary to the psychopathy that we both moved through? And out of? I think it a great historical episode and one that the youths of today will have to take on board and finish off? Or perhaps not. Perhaps it was a full stop. The youths of today have moved on by doing their own thing that in turn moves on towards their own full stop. They are emerged in their own paragraph. An endless series of climbing’s punctuation. Perhaps a few will turn a few pages back…

Dominic and Jeremy and the film crew stayed in a caravan overnight in the car park next door. They likened the experience to a safari! They stayed awake all night terrified at the noises of the inner city jungle. This is the weekend hunting ground of frivolity and bravery with its resident shouting and groaning and the dark savagery of the pack on the scent. I always said there is more wildlife here than on the peaks of Snowdon! And there is also more humanity, working itself out without the trickery of a fairytale land that says all is well! It isn’t. I like the fact that the city screams, “All is not well.” Beware! Sturdy creatures dwell here!

From this ‘Pool of Life’, I turn on the tap and watch the water flow over an upturned spoon in the sink as if a river meandering over rocks – it seems to belong, and listen, in its flowing, to the great, grey rivers of the world. And surely, when I turn the spotlight on, the solar wind charges across the solar system in the ceramic bowl and the spoon radiates with the energy of a thousand stars.

Granada TV had previously invited me for a slot in their arts programme, Celebrations. A few months before I had tried to gain permission to climb the Anglican cathedral but had been adamantly refused by the church authorities. “This is a sacred house of God,” seemed to seal my aspirations. However, thanks to ‘financing’ from Granada TV, this particular ‘sacred house of God’ came at a price! Negotiations were made and I was filmed on my ascent of The Apostles at about E3 5c. Maneuvering by the third apostle, the pinch grip I was using on his nose came off in my fingers! I had chalked up the previous two Apostle’s noses and had laughed at the thought of them taking cocaine! I guiltily placed this sandstone appendage in my inside pocket and climbed on more gingerly to the centre of the huge, mullioned rose, the symbolic mandala above the high altar. I returned later and abseiled down with a tube of glue! I laughed again at thoughts of a glue-sniffing Apostle!

Tony Wilson

I was later introduced by Tony Wilson on the six o’clock news as the first performance mountaineer!

As a climber, this was taken further thanks to being invited to play with urban trash percussionists, Urban Strawberry Lunch. They were Liverpool’s noisy, energetic outlaws that banged anything for a musical jape. Climbing, rigging and playing buildings became my first incursion into textural sounds and electro acoustic compositions. Climbing and playing the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester was particularly challenging and inspiring. Home to the Halle Orchestra, this glass structure is supported by huge stainless steel springs which the auditorium is then suspended from. It is built to withstand earthquakes and reduce any external noise from the street. We were told that it would be like playing a dry sock! As sound terrorists, we were initially despondent. However, as we explored the structure for potential, it transpired that if you placed the sucker of a bog-plunger on the plate glass, a strange and eerie whining materialized from the passing of traffic outside. With fishing lines attached to the external structure, an Aeolian harp was established. Amplification brought these sculptural sounds into aural existence. Ambient recordings of doors, stairwells and voices added to the orchestration of the building that was anything but a dry sock, for the opening of the International Festival of new Music!

John Redhead 2011: Images J Redhead collection apart from Indian Face image

This Week: John Redhead finds himself in Fairytale land

Redhead you say !

" I was once stepping over a stile with my dog on a lead, on my way to climb a route on Tryfan, when a farmer approached me and said he wanted the dog off his land. A scrawled sign on the gate said, Dogs on a Lead. I asked him if he could read English and carried on.

He persisted aggressively with his demands. I refused, saying I was on a designated footpath within the National Park and what right had he got to harass me? He came at me to fight! I pushed him away and his glasses fell to the ground, breaking a lens. He was in rage. He went into his house nearby and came out with a twelve bore shotgun. He raised it up and pointed it at me, at which his wife threw herself out of the house screaming at him in Welsh. She stood between me and the gun. It was a nasty scene. A twitch away from News at Ten. Ugly. He backed off shaking in a mess of a man. I actually felt sorry for him. The old boy should be hanging out with girls in grass skirts swinging his hips to some samba rift on a Caribbean island, pissed up on coconut cocktails!

Why is the land such a burden to these people? Is this due to the conflicts and restraints of a hard life fighting nature and resenting those enjoying it? I shouldn’t feel sorry for being free in the land. You shouldn’t get used to this aggression.'

Following last week's slice of Johnny Dawes,this week another iconic rock master in the shape of John Redhead offers extracts from his forthcoming book 'Colonists Out'. Including John's take on the Indian Face affair. UK climbing's remarkable cause celebre in the 1980's in which Redhead and Dawes played out the key roles in a captivating piece of rock theatre upon Clogwyn Du Arddu's intimidating field of dreams.