{"id":8555,"date":"2024-10-10T19:11:00","date_gmt":"2024-10-10T18:11:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.haydnwilliams.com\/blog\/?p=8555"},"modified":"2024-11-10T19:12:31","modified_gmt":"2024-11-10T19:12:31","slug":"mountain-leader-training","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.haydnwilliams.com\/blog\/mountain-leader-training\/","title":{"rendered":"Mountain Leader Training"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It’s been some twenty-or-so years since a few of my peers did their Mountain Leader (ML) training, and a couple of weeks ago I finally got around to scratching the itch myself. We did lots of learning in Cubs and Scouts, but the only semi-formal training I’ve ever had was with the university rambling society<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n

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You have to navigate back quite a few years to reach this point.
\u00a9 Gary Mirams 2004<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

My expectation of ML was that it would be an opportunity to check quite rigorously that I hadn’t fallen into too many bad habits with my nav, not least because I mostly run around now instead of rambling (and there’s a tendency to be happy with ‘good enough’ nav rather than ‘spot on’ nav).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Potential mountain legends.
\u00a9 Emma Holland 2024<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

It didn’t turn out quite like that, but in a good way. Our group of six met up with instructor Paul<\/a> in Capel, and proceeded to spend the day doing a bit of nav and a bit of other stuff around Bochlwyd and Idwal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It quickly became clear that the syllabus now places a huge amount of emphasis on the more holistic aspects of leading a group through mountainous terrain. This includes a broad but not necessarily encyclopaedic knowledge of things you might come across or be asked about whilst in a leader role. Examples we were given include flora and fauna, geology, land use (and access), language and place names, industrial heritage, and myths and legends. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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“So when I did the Spine…<\/em>” Running the group through my steam-powered GPS.
\u00a9 Emma Holland 2024<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

So I now have plenty of exciting things to read up on, and it’s definitely making me consider how much I know about the areas I’m going out in. The average consolidation period, from training to assessment, is apparently about three-and-a-half years, but hopefully with some application of effort I’ll be able to get through a bit more quickly. Not that there is a potential change of career or similar driving this – it’s purely a personal learning experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Trust exercise to descend steep ground safely. Sponsored by Mountain Equipment, apparently.
\u00a9 Paul Poole 2024<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The second part of the split weekend was run by Emma<\/a>, because one of the requirements is that it can’t all be delivered by one person, and included the overnight wild camp \/ ‘expedition’ (which seems like a big word for one night under canvas). We also had a wander up Heather Terrace, and did some very fun night nav on the expedition too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Heather Terrace hole.
\u00a9 Emma Holland 2024<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

All in all, a very interesting and fun couple of weekends. A big ‘thank you’ to Paul and Emma, and to my course-mates who helped ensure the whole thing was very chilled out and entertaining. Here’s to all of us becoming MLs soon!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Yeah, sure…. I know exactly<\/em> where we are.
\u00a9\u00a0Emma Holland 2024<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s been some twenty-or-so years since a few of my...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8576,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[1430,1432,309],"class_list":["post-8555","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-outdoors","tag-eryri","tag-ml","tag-snowdonia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.haydnwilliams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8555","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.haydnwilliams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.haydnwilliams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.haydnwilliams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.haydnwilliams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8555"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.haydnwilliams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8555\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.haydnwilliams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8576"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.haydnwilliams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8555"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.haydnwilliams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8555"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.haydnwilliams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8555"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}