Everything in our culture tells us to look forward, reach upwards, eye on the prize, visualise the path to success, shoot for the moon. No day is more imbued with this vision than the first of the new year, when we embark on the cultural ritual of the New Year’s Resolution.
Andy Kirkpatrick: ‘Old School’
The other day I found an old book on my shelf when its tatty green spine caught my eye as I thumbed across the shelf looking for something else. Many times before I had passed it by, but this time my eyes fixed on it and my book blindness, caused by its ever-presence, suddenly lifted…
Tom Livingstone: ‘Sugar Rush’
A visit to Red Walls should contain as much excitement as nervousness. This piece describes two days of trad climbing with John Orr and Tim Neill at Red Walls – one of the finest crags at Gogarth.
European Outdoor Conservation Association: ‘Making a difference’
In the summer of 2006, a small group of outdoor companies got together with the aim of raising money to put back into the Great Outdoors. They wanted to find a way of funding practical, on-the-ground conservation projects…
Andy Kirkpatrick: ‘Dehydrated’
I once went climbing with the comedian Ed Bryne, who told me he hated dehydrated food, because it tasted like shit “so I bought myself a dehydrator,” he said “so I could make my own food that tasted like shit”…
Andy Kirkpatrick: ‘Polar Poodles’
Don’t you just hate when someone brings you down to size. When someone bursts your bubble. I do it myself – in fact I relish in giving a kick to an overblown ego. My primary vehicle for this is the language of the extreme…
Andy Kirkpatrick: ‘Piteraq’
I climbed with a remarkable Norwegian last winter called Aleks Gamme, probably best know as the gnarly bloke from the film ‘Crossing the Ice’, in which he raced to be the first person to ski to and from the South Pole without support or kites (he sort of won)…