Life on the road! What a whirlwind of a few days, with so many miles travelled and so much to take in. On Wednesday I travelled to Largs on the west coast of Scotland to take part in the Association of Heads of Outdoor Education Centres annual conference. Thankfully, I didn't have to do the driving, as I was sharing a lift with some others from North Wales. We arrived to find stellar mountaineering conditions, with fresh snow on the hills, blue skies and a hard frost. Sadly, we'd be indoors for it all! We were staying at the National Sports Centre, which had fabulous views from our room and eight foot long beds to accommodate the national basket ball teams that trained there!
It's a shame that I'm no whisky drinker as the nearby Isle of Arran had donated endless samples for the influx of travelling delegates to quench their thirst on arrival.
The conference ran over two days and I took part in several different workshops, debates and presentations. I particularly liked this slide from one of the safety seminars!
The keynote speaker after dinner on Thursday was Alistair Humphries, who gave a really good presentation on how to inspire and encourage people to take part in adventures within their everyday life. One of his most famous 'expeditions' was a winter circumnavigation of the M25. Ha ha!
On Friday morning, Phil and I hiked up above the centre to get some fresh air and soak up the views before the first lecture. Arran in the distance, looked incredible with the peaks all snow covered. I was somewhat gutted to not be able to make use of the conditions.
And if that wasn't enough learning for one day, once the conference closed, we sped back down the M6 and just made it to the avalanche training keynote lecture at Plas y Brenin at 19:30. The event had been on all day, but we were allowed in to listen to the latest in avalanche research from a visiting French mountain guide called Alan Dubois, who is generally acknowledged as 'the knowledge' on such things. A full day of learning and my brain was tired by the time I arrived back at The Cottage at 22:30, hungry and exhausted....
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