Twenty years ago the most popular pages on Doodlecat were the TGO Challenge diaries. They were often used as a resource for the aspiring challenger looking for clues as to the terrain. What did all that white paper and brown squiggles on the OS maps represent? Would the overnight camp spot be on smooth greensward, horrible bog or waist high heather?
Plus of course – what sort of people are these challengers anyway?
Now Google Earth lets us zoom in on that loop in the river – oh yes, that looks a decent grassy spot. Dozens of blogs, YouTube videos and photo diaries are published every year. Has that sense of stepping into the unknown disappeared? A little perhaps, but Scotland can always be guaranteed to spring surprises on the unwary! Yes, we still enjoy sharing other people’s adventures; with admiration for those overcoming adversities, and perhaps the odd frisson of schadenfreude.
But there’s something more. The much missed Mr Grumpy (Peter Goddard) remarked that the old stories that Doodlecat had gathered, especially those from the pre-digital age, were well worth preserving as an historical archive of the challenge. In recent years we have lost many of those early challengers. Their tales, once retold and embellished at many a reunion, are lost too.
Or are they? In cupboards & drawers across the land old diaries photos, negatives, slides etc. languish, waiting to be digitised & brought back to life.
Do you have something in the attic that our readers might enjoy? Then use the “contact us” form to get in touch and share those memories!
Today is tomorrow’s past
Twenty years ago … seems like yesterday to me, but some of today’s challengers weren’t even born. Which brings me to a second request. I’d like a few more recent stories for preservation in the archive. It doesn’t have to be created from scratch – I recently experimented with converting a couple of blog series into Challenge accounts. Essentially they now begin at the beginning and end at the end (unlike the typical blog, which does the opposite) and are not lost under layers of new posts. A big thank you to David Williams and Louise Evans for allowing me to reformat & republish your work.
I am especially interested in first times and themed walks, and of course recording the changing nature of the Highlands. As they become more and more enmeshed with turbines cables and pylons even recent diaries will, I am sure, record a dreadful loss of landscapes and habitat that we once held dear. The photo below was a remote hill path when I first walked it in 2004. Not a turbine in sight. Then the green industrialists had their way, and this is now just part of a sprawling network of access roads
What a depressing picture that is. But enough of that. There’s a helluva lot left. Let’s explore it, enjoy it, celebrate it and preserve it!
So, do tell. What’s your story?
Spill the beans and … Contact Us
