WELCOME
HERE’S MY CONTROVERSIAL OPINION: I dislike summer. I shun the sun as it shines in too-blue skies and saturates yellowing hillsides. I feel irrational hostility towards the heat and the sticky slap of suncream on skin. During the warmer months, I am drawn out of doors almost exclusively in the cool of high dawns and tepid twilights to sleep under the stars or to seek shade in valleys and plunge into cold water.
Historically, our summers haven’t stuck around too long – luckily for me and the delicate balance of our life-supporting mountain ecology. But the snow melted fast this year before our warm, wet winter gave way to a record-breaking hot April globally. We have to face it: summer in the hills of home may look and feel different in the future. My mind flashes back to mountains of Eryri and the heat stroke my husband suffered during a hot spell. We recall the ordeal on page 28 in the hopes you may learn from our mistakes.
The pressure to ‘make the most’ of summer whilst it’s here is palpable each year. In my experience, when compared with the life-or-death preparedness of winter in the mountains with zero wiggle room for error, the heat can lull hillwalkers into a false sense of security. Summer continues to be the busiest season for many Mountain Rescue teams across Britain, too. So, we are delighted once again to be working with Glenmore Lodge, sportscotland’s National Outdoor Training Centre, to bring you 10 pages of advice on skilling up for summer so you can have your most confident season out in the mountains yet (page 48).
Elsewhere in the magazine, I challenge you not to be moved by Norman Hadley’s profou
