LOSING MY MOUNTAIN MOJO – AND HOW I GOT IT BACK.

I was fortunate to retire 12 years ago, at the age of 58, and doubly fortunate to have remained fit and healthy enough since then to enjoy a happy and active retirement. In my 60’s I’ve been lucky to carry on rambling both at home and abroad, completing several multi-day hikes in the process. My wife, Pat, retired shortly after me and has accompanied me on most of these adventures.

We’ve been very lucky by any standards – which makes the interlude I’m about to describe so baffling to me. I’m writing about it now to try and make sense of what happened and also to maybe help and reassure anyone else encountering a similarly unexpected obstacle along an otherwise smooth path through later life.

Looking back ten years, I don’t recall that turning 60 bothered me in the slightest. If anything it served to remind me to regularly count my blessings and be grateful that I was lucky enough to be pursue into dotage an activity that has brought me such joy throughout my life.

Of course, ageing does have an inevitable impact. Clearly, in your mid-60’s you can’t do everything you did in your mid-30’s, but I accepted the odd ache and pain and the loss of speed, agility and endurance with equanimity. I don’t remember feeling sorry for myself or bemoaning this general “slowing down”. If I did start to moan, I quickly thought of those contemporaries who, for one reason or another, couldn’t now do what I did and a few others who sadly weren’t around to even try.

So, I was still enjoying hill walking as much as ever when, quite unexpectedly, as I approached 70 my mindset changed dramatically, affecting my mood and approach to walking. I still don’t really understand what triggered this negativity. I was not consciously aware of worrying about approaching the biblical lifespan of “three score years and ten” and can’t think of any other specific factor that could have prompted such a very real change in me – a change manifested by not only a loss of enthusiasm for walking, but also other interests such as music, reading, writing and socialising.

Around six months before my 70^th birthday I considered that I was in fact “over the hill” and part of this outlook meant that I wasn’t at all keen on going over too many more hills. Another indication of my negativity was that I refused to plan any birthday celebrations, because I didn’t consider there was anything worth celebrating.

In terms of the walking, no amount of cajoling by a very supportive wife could convince me that I wasn’t finished as a fellsman. Even when Pat reminded me that only a few months earlier, in September 2022, I had accompanied her on a few fairly challenging (for us) walks to enable her to complete her Wainwrights – for example, the Mosedale Horseshoe in Wasdale and a round of Rossett Pike, Bowfell and Esk Pike in Langdale – I insisted for me long days on the fells were a thing of the past. Ignoring such persuasive evidence to the contrary, I continued to insist that I was washed-up. Looking back: I was in a bad place.  

After turning 70, in May 2023, I continued to mope around, clinging to my negative outlook for a few more months, until suddenly what now seems a miraculous transformation took place. The turning point came in September, four months after my birthday, when I unexpectedly started getting my interest and self-belief back.

It happened like this. We were going to the Lake District for a couple of weeks, but I didn’t expect to be capable of anything but the most sedate ramble. Then, while poring over the maps I recalled some of the big walks I’d done and was hit by the stark reality that in my current state I’d probably never again experience the joy and satisfaction of a long, hard day on the fells. This suddenly seemed an unacceptably bleak prospect so I tentatively plotted a few longish walks on the map, but was still not really confident that I’d be up to actually walking them on the ground!

Our trip to Cumbria duly arrived and on the way to our log cabin in Keswick we stayed at one of my favourite Lakeland pubs – the Brittania Inn at Elterwater in Great Langdale.

When I first ventured onto the Lakeland fells as a 12 year old boy-scout the Langdale Valley was my playground: the place I frequented most, due to its easy accessibility by bus from my home in Lancaster. One of the jewels of Great Langdale are the Langdale Pikes, which viewed from the valley near Elterwater present a striking, oft painted and photographed, vista. I’d not walked over the Pikes for a while and though I plotted a route that would take us over two of them, this was more in hope than expectation, this being the sort of walk that I’d concluded was now well beyond me.

The valley was shrouded in a fine drizzle when we checked into the inn but, while the long-range forecast was not good, it suggested that the next day offered a brief “window” when a walk on the tops might be possible.

I don’t know if it was something in the mountain air, or in the Brittannia’s beer, but I suddenly found myself thinking that a hike over the Pikes might be possible. So, as a brighter day dawned, we had a go and to my surprise completed it – we were slow, but we got round in one piece and I got a huge lift from completing a great walk relatively comfortably.

The day after the elation of completing the Langdale circuit, we were brought down to earth with a very wet and misty bang and spent a low-level day walking up Lingmoor Fell from Elterwater. Unfortunately, Pat sustained a nasty leg injury on this walk which prevented her doing anymore serious walking for the rest of the trip.

By the time we got to our Keswick cabin I was fired with a new enthusiasm and my thoughts turned to another walk that had seemed out of reach just a few weeks before – a round of Coledale. This is a classic hike, which climbs five of the Wainwright fells encircling Coledale, in the stunning North Western fells. I say “A” round rather than “The” round because there are longer variants of this walk available, although the route I had in mind omits only one summit from that described by Wainwright.  It is regarded as a challenge and a walk that I’ve done many times in all its variants, but one that I’d concluded would not be enjoyed again in this lifetime.

The wet and misty weather continued and on a Sunday morning I awoke to find the cloud stubbornly clinging to the fields outside our cabin, although the forecast suggested the gloom would lift later in the day. By now I was becoming excited and not a little obsessed by the prospect of completing the round so I decided to go to the starting point at Brathwaite and give it a go, banking on the forecast proving correct. As I set off in steady drizzle I intended to continue to Coledale Hause, roughly half way, and if the weather hadn’t improved, retreat down the valley rather than continue the horseshoe walk around the tops.   

Without the compensation of the magnificent views enjoyed on clear days, the long, steep, arduous climb up Grisedale Pike was a damp, clammy unpleasant experience as the cloud and rain closed in. There was, however, some compensation for a walker like me who hates overcrowded hills (defined as more than two or three people around ): because of the adverse weather, the route – one of the most popular in Lakeland – was virtually deserted. Even allowing for the weather, this surprised me given that it was a Sunday, normally the busiest day of the week on the fells. 

The wet, misty weather continued for the first half of the walk, but, as if by magic, as I approached my potential escape route at Coledale Hause the clouds started to lift, along with my spirits, so, I decided to press on.

The second half of the circuit was a delight and I continued to enjoy my splendid isolation, now enhanced by the breath-taking extensive views that were appearing . By the time I descended to Braithwaite along the spectacular ridge running down off Barrow I felt elated to have finished a fine walk and started to actually believe that I was in fact not “over the hill”.

Looking back now from a much happier place, I’m ashamed to admit how I’d approached what is simply a number after my name, but all I can say is that all the negativity I felt, but could not control, was very real to me and after a while had begun to feel “normal”.

The effect of completing these two long walks profoundly affected my miserable mood and I experienced that uplifting, intoxicated feeling I’d had when discovering the Lakeland hills for the first time all those years ago.

I’m not daft enough to suggest that hill walking is a panacea for all that ails us, but it can’t do any harm and I believe that – as at other times in my life when I’ve felt a little flat – the Lakeland hills worked some of their magic in helping recover my “mountain mojo”. 

Different people respond to different stimuli, but all I can say is that for me, mountains are good for the mind. I’ve now fully returned to a much more positive mindset and am focusing not on what I can no longer do, but instead celebrating the many things that I still can.

I was recently reminded of a conversation with a walking mate back when we were both in our 30’s. He said he remembered me saying that I’d be well pleased if I was lucky enough to be still walking the high fells in my 70’s (in fact I think I said 60’s, an age that seemed ancient to me then). A timely reminder of how much I’ve got to be thankful for.

Why do so many of us continue to try and defy the ravages of age and venture to high places? For me, as good a reason as any is to continue to experience that feeling of “being more alive” that mountain walking provides.

For a few words on one of the great pleasures of spending time in the hills – the joys of waking to a mountain morning – I’ll turn not to Alfred Wainwright for a change but to another writer who had an eye for a good view and quite a way with words;

Full many a glorious morning have I seen

Flatter the mountain tops with sovereign eye,

Kissing the golden face the meadows green,

Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy.

William Shakespeare, from the Sonnets.

History doesn’t record whether Will ever ventured onto the Lakeland fells or sampled a pint in one of the many excellent pubs to be found there, although I have heard rumours that he had, but he’d been Bard from many of them. (Sorry)

So, I carry on rambling. This doesn’t mean that I’m appearing in a revival of the once highly popular “Carry On” franchise. Although, in failing to make “Carry On Rambling” I think the producers missed a trick: I can picture Sid James, Charles Hawtrey and Barbara Windsor setting out to explore the Yorkshire Dales, with Sid behaving badly with a barmaid after several pints of Black Sheep in a Dales pub, Charles losing his glasses in the wind and rain and mincing over the edge of Malham Cove under the weight of his enormous pack ( cue a chorus of “ooh, matron”) and Babs stripping off for a skinny dip in the river Wharfe. I’d pay good money to see that, but perhaps I’ve just got a fevered imagination and bad taste in movies?

For anyone who wants to follow in our footsteps, the routes for the two walks briefly outlined here are described in more detail in the first blogs in a series of “Over The Hill Hikes”.