Country diary

Unable to extricate my car from the grip of winter clamping the Lake District over the Christmas holidays, I caught the bus to Keswick from Grasmere in brilliant moonlight. As the double-decker breasted Dunmail Raise to then descend the pass there was a glimpse of a gully on Dollywaggon Pike minus waterfalls. Just a lofty streak of ice, banked in on either side by snowdrifts. And then it was gone, and we were descending to the Siberian wastes of Thirlmere. That was a climb I once did with climber Frank Davies. It was his first lead up an icefall with an axe in each fist and the front-points of his crampons inching their way upwards until he topped-out and belayed high above. Coincidentally in November we met up again after a time at Kendal Mountain Festival and reminisced, as climbers do. Memories included that first lead on ice, an accomplishment every bit a benchmark as sharp-ending his first rock climb which he had notched many years previously under the aegis of the Rock and Ice climbing club. A grin lit his face as he remembered; just one of many mountain days including, in 1971, jointly as driver breaking the record still held today with fell running doyen Joss Naylor for the Three Peaks Challenge . Their time for Joss's ticking the tops of Ben Nevis, Scafell Pike and Snowdon? Under 12 hours. And there my reverie was interrupted on Nest Brow by a walker on the seat behind. He was saying the ethereal light on the fells was because it was a blue moon, and we all duly craned our necks to gaze up at the source of this marvel. And illuminated all around through the salt-encrusted windows were the sugar-white ghosts sending out their clarion call to ice warriors (and warrioresses) everywhere.