The Student Times, Tuesday 2 February 1999
T.E. Lawrence in the Seven Pillars of Wisdom wrote:
"All men dream but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find it was in vanity : but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act out there dreams with open eyes, to make it possible"
I, to a certain extent, have always been a dreamer and occasionally I have acted upon them. Back in September at the Sports Union Fresher's Fare I, like so many others, moved from stand to stand choosing which club to join, personally it was more as a way to meet people which prompted me to go, It sometimes seams that Uni is a big place. Anyway it wasn't long till I came across the Rucksack Club, and after talking to Fiona the current President I was convinced that maybe this club was for me and the fact I wasn't required to hand over any money till I attended the open slide show night, was cool considering the hard sell I encountered from some of the other clubs.
The show itself was well attended and informative with an intro to the committee members and a talk on everything you would need to know. What topped it off for me was the slide show during which I saw a collection of photos of Scottish mountains in all weathers, and students like you and me climbing / walking in some of the most amazing places I had ever seen, but most of all everyone enjoying themselves.
Two weeks later I found myself on a mini bus heading up to Glen Etive for the weekend with 26 others, I could write about a lot of events and good experiences that weekend like, seeing a herd of deer running up the glen, going for a piss and being surrounded by mountains while above my head was the most stars I have ever seen. The well equipped hut and the monster 3 course meal cooked by members, the quiet Saturday night spent getting totally blitzed, playing climbing games, songs and getting on with people who the day before just faces but now had personalities larger than life itself.
But I would like to tell you about the events on the Sunday. I was awoken by one of the committee to go walking , I was a bit the worse for ware but he convinced me to go, as it was to be good and he wasn't wrong. As the mini busses drove up Glen Etive towards Glen Coe the sun was so warm most of us were in T-shirts !. It wasn't long till we found ourselves in a car park looking up at Buachaille Etive Mor, a monster mountain which dominates the area, a fortress if ever there was one.
Once we were sorted into groups, I found myself in the advance party taking up the rear ! that day we were set to do a scramble climb called Curved Ridge. Scrambling is one step below rock climbing, the step being you don't use ropes!. It wasn't long however till we had caught up and overtaken the other groups to find ourselves scrambling up an inclined near vertical cliff with lots of flat shelf's for our group to rest up and take photo's. The higher we climbed the better the views became and the colder it got, it seamed that the whole Glen opened up before us and we could see for miles. Where the rain the day before had created hundreds of puddles these were now transformed into lakes of silver reflecting the sun.
Neil mentioned to me that in Scotland you can easily have four seasons in one day, and it was easy to understand why for within about a half an hour the cloud base had come in and it had started to snow !, standing 900 metres up on a cliff face with the snow flakes blowing around in the company of good experienced people and amazing scenery is not something you get to experience sitting in a Monday morning lecture room. Anyway I was told not to worry about the conditions as we were almost at the top and a couple of minutes later we topped out, coming upon a pile of stones which made up the summit cairn. On top suddenly and without warning the cloud base cleared and we could see for miles and miles, the senior club members were able to pick out the mountain tops all around and off in the distance, apparently you can see Schiehallion from anywhere in Scotland. The views were really amazing and looked as if the peaks had been covered with a sprinkling of white icing sugar, that day I ran off a whole roll of film.
The remainder of the walk took us over the back of the Buachaille to the second Munro descending to the hut from which we had set out that morning.
24 hours later I had the pleasure of sitting in a dull lecture looking out the window and dreaming of the weekend past. As I write this I reckon TE Lawrence was right, for to climb mountains you have to be a day dreamer of sorts. The Rucksack Club is full of like minded people from a lot of different countries and backgrounds who have a common purpose to get out and live. I took a leap of faith joining D.U.R.C. and trusting people I had never met before but I can safely say I would have no reservation in recommending you to do the same. The club has been everything and more than I could have hoped for.
DURC meet every Tuesday night at Speedwell Bar (Perth Road) from 9pm.
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