Thoughts and Contemplations

S-PEAKING WITH A MOUNTAIN

| sophiekemsley

There is a particularly famous Chinese proverb which we are probably all familiar with:

“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”

We can probably all see it right now, written in a swooshy font, pasted over a picture of a mountain range or the sole of a battered old hiking boot stepping off into a sunset, and posted somewhere within our social media newsfeeds. It’s arguably so well saturated a quote, that the impact has probably been diluted over the years. Yet, as I stood at the foot of Moel Siabod – the tenth highest mountain in Snowdonia – looking up in slight dismay at the height of the summit I was aiming for, that very same proverb was one of the first things to spring to mind, and it set me on my way. Albeit quite gingerly at first.

I was walking the mountain alone, a context which I knew wasn’t ideal but which was also a driver behind the determination to do it. I had been debating with myself for a while and the internal dialogue had gone something like this:

“Could I do it?”
“…Maybe it’s safer not to. Go for a coffee and do some writing, instead!”
“Okay then, I’ll do the mountain.”

I wasn’t completely naive to the challenge and risk of doing a mountain hike alone, and carried out a fair amount of research beforehand, equipping myself with all the right safety gear for if I were to get stuck: first aid kit, plenty of extra food, an emergency whistle, bright attire to be visible to rescue services, a power pack to charge my phone, and a headtorch for if I were to get stranded into nightfall. All the gear, and definitely some idea, although it’s also fair to admit that despite this I’d still underestimated quite how challenging the walk would be. Having done Snowdon several times I thought I’d have no trouble with a smaller mountain, and that was rookie mistake number one. The height is one thing, the accessibility is something completely different. In selecting to ascend Moel Siabod via the eastern Daear Du ridge I’d chosen a route which would involve a lot more physical challenge than I was expecting. This walk required hands as well as feet, but I wouldn’t realise that until way too late. Nor did I realise that I would be the only person climbing this particular mountain that morning.

I left my car in Pont Cyfyng and crossed the river, past Rhos Farm, to begin my ascent to a peak I’d been told gave way to some of the finest views of Snowdonia. I’d naturally gravitated towards choosing Moel Siabod for my solo hike. It was close to where I’d been staying in Betws-y-Coed and the route back afterwards would take me past Ty Hyll – the famous ‘Ugly House’ – which a friend had told me was great for cake. Not only that, but it was also close to Dyffryn Farm, the subject of ‘I Bought a Mountain’ and home of the incredibly inspiring Esme Kirby who I had been writing about only a couple of months earlier. Moel Siabod. Alone. It just had to be.

The first couple of hours went by without too much drama, following a steep, boggy and almost waterfall-like in parts path that ran along the left hand side of the mountain. It was strenuous at times and incredibly wet, but I could see where I needed to go at least and that was half the battle won. I kept thinking about the peanut butter and marmite bagel I had in my bag and how despite my lingering hunger I’d save it for the summit, when it would taste even better than it would on terra firma. Food – fuel in more ways than one – the prospect of it keeping me going.


I reached the Daear Du ridge in tired but high spirits. Between lashings of heavy rain and snow there had been gorgeous outbreaks of sunshine that had illuminated the landscape and were able to transform the neighbouring Llyn y Foel lake from a pit of ominous bubbling treacle to a shimmering cobalt masterpiece. Now that I was at the ridge the summit was surely within sight, and that bagel would shortly be out of its foil and exposing itself to the elements… and my mouth.

Except it wasn’t that straightforward, as I had absolutely no idea how to progress along the ridge. A clear pathway was no longer visible; replaced instead with a bunch of rocks and boulders of numerous different shapes of sizes that made it harder to see the way beyond. All I could do to navigate my way was to try and move myself ever-further in the direction of the summit, and hopefully that would work. I pulled myself up the first boulder and just knew it was going to be a long couple of hours to the summit. I knew I was in roughly the right place, but had no idea if the particular boulders I chose to climb were right. It’s fair to say I went down a few proverbial rabbit holes: routes that turned out not to be routes, dead ends, insurmountable rocks, and numerous U-turns. And these seemed to go on for ages. In blizzards of snow which only obscured my vision and froze my fingers further.

There were several points at which I sat down and sighed, and deliberated eating my bagel early. It was during these moments that I started to think that maybe I had made a massive mistake in trying to do this alone. At times I felt completely stuck and was convinced that this wasn’t going to end well; either a sheepish (no pun intended) call to Mountain Rescue or worse, my carrion-pecked corpse being discovered weeks or months later, a half eaten bagel disintegrated into the dirt beside me. I considered recording a note on my phone to explain what had happened and how I was sorry for being so stupid to have come on this walk alone. It sounds far-fetched now; yet at the time it felt so very real. My story had a (spoiler alert) happy ending but a lot of others don’t, and for all the wonders of climbing mountains, it’s important to consider at all times just how dangerous they can be too.

I had three options. Either I try and go back on myself and head home, call Mountain Rescue for assistance off the ridge, or I just carry on. I knew what I wanted to do, but had to consider whether it was the wisest or safest thing. Almost immediately, I judged that it was. To go back on myself would involve a risky and steep descent back to the main path and at least two hours walking back, not to mention a feeling of disappointment and failure. To call Mountain Rescue felt a bit unnecessary just yet, and could divert them from greater emergencies elsewhere. I had to just do this. I just had to do this.

At the same time I heard the voice of society within:
“You shouldn’t have done this on your own” it said, “especially not as a woman. What were you thinking?!”
It was hard not to see the point of the imaginary voice in my head. What had I been thinking? If I’d had somebody with me, we would have been able to problem-solve together. Maybe they’d have been able to see the path I’d clearly failed to see. Maybe a big, strong man would have been able to plough on ahead to work out the route and come back to give me a lift-up and encouragement when I needed it.

Or maybe those internal voices are just a manifestation of messages that have been pushed upon us by society for decades. And maybe I needed to shove a dummy in its mouth.

I promptly sought out the biggest rock around me and dragged myself up onto it. Then the next one. And the next. I was tired, a bit delirious, and still not sure I was going the right way, but knew that to keep on going was my only choice. Bagel or no bagel, I had to keep moving. The summit may have felt like a thousand miles away, but with every single step west, I was getting closer to it. There would be no turning back.

Heavy winds and further snow blizzards set in. They weren’t ideal but the feet and hands I’d previously doubted weren’t failing me, mainly thanks to decent boots and gloves. I was finally progressing along the ridge that I’d thought was going to be my nemesis. Step by step. Rock by rock. One step at a time – that’s all it needed to be. In weather I couldn’t control but just needed to endure.

And then there it was. The trig point marking the summit of Moel Siabod. The finest trig point I’ve ever seen, even if I was too frozen to appreciate it fully. I had made it – I think. My head was completely spun and didn’t feel too sure of anything anymore. Until I turned round and saw the most beautiful rainbow above a snow-capped mountain range:

This may sound a self-congratulatory post, it’s not meant to be. Thousands of people climb mountains every day. Instead, it’s about some of the concepts that arose from the trek and how they can apply to many things in life, something a friend recently described beautifully as ‘symmetries of nature’.

A mountain can seem huge and daunting but when broken down into single steps, not so much.
Equally, we can’t control the weather; but we can control whether we choose to carry on throughout. A glove here; a waterproof jacket there – there are things we can do to adapt – and the heaviest of rain and greyest of skies will often lead only to the most beautiful rainbows. One of the most aesthetically pleasing presentations of the weather is only able to occur because of another that is so often maligned – how wonderful is that? A tough climb makes for an even sweeter summit.

To descend from the mountain I followed a much simpler path on the western side that led down to the village of Capel Curig, affording wonderful views of Llynau Mymbyr and Dyffryn Farm looking down on it. By this point, the cake was almost in sight, and I was feeling that I had really earned it. I was proud to have reached the summit and arguably even more so for having done it alone. Had it really been unwise to do so? I’m not so sure it was. They say there’s safety in numbers but sometimes I think that’s a bit of an illusion; maybe company would have been a distraction, maybe we’d have been so ensconced in gossip that we misplaced a foot and took a nasty tumble, maybe we would have relied on each other too much and underestimated the scale of the challenge, leaving behind the safety gear. Maybe one of us would have slipped whilst trying to give the other a leg-up. Maybe that’s a lot of maybes.

Maybe it’s not always black and white.

I’ll think about Moel Siabod forever.

LESSONS IN WOMANHOOD FROM SOME LADIES ON A BUS

| sophiekemsley

This month I’ve struggled to unfasten myself from Cheryl Strayed’s gripping memoir, ‘Wild’. It tells the tale of her 1,100 mile hike across America’s Pacific Crest Trail in the 1990’s, as a woman in her late ’20’s.

Cheryl undertook this mammoth feat at a time in her personal life in which she was struggling, having recently lost her mother and divorced from a man she still cared about a huge amount but just couldn’t see a future with. For her, the Trail was an opportunity for self-discovery, and a way to prove to herself that she not only can, but does. I’m only halfway through the book but already understand why it was a #1 Best Seller in the New York Times, and material for a blockbuster movie starring Reese Witherspoon.

It seems quite fitting to be reading this book in the same week as International Women’s Day, a time to revere in all things womanhood, and celebrate those wonderful females both past and present who have ever taken a risk that paved the way for the rest of us to do the same. Women who have ever diverged from the beaten track of societal norms. Women who didn’t – or don’t – allow their gender to determine what they can or can’t do. Strong, loving and caring women who hold their own and have a positive impact on those around them, in whatever way that may be.

I have met many inspiring women over the years, for a multitude of different reasons, and I appreciate their influence every day, but recently – and no doubt inspired by my choice of literature at the moment – I have particularly been thinking about female explorers, a bit like Cheryl Strayed (who I obviously haven’t met, but would love to one day). Women who set out on their own to explore the world around them, even if their bags were painfully heavy (like Cheryl’s), even if their shoes were worn, and even if – by the very nature of being a lone woman in a foreign place – they were at a heightened risk of nasty things happening to them along the way.

There have been a number of inspiring female explorers throughout history. Amelia Earhart or the aptly named Isabella Bird may be among the first that spring to mind, and whilst their influence cannot be downplayed, I often think that among the most inspiring are those who we come across in our day to day. The hidden heroines who come in and out of our lives leaving longer term lessons behind.


I thought back to a trip to Canada I had made in the Summer of 2006, a few months before my 21st birthday. It was my first time traveling without anyone I knew and as such, I had approached it with a bit of trepidation and unease. Overall, I managed fine, but do remember being a little upset one day whilst we were staying in a beautiful riverside hostel at Fort Coulonge – some nonsense to do with a phone and worrying about some administrative issues back home regarding University accommodation for the following term. I remember sitting on the thin, lumpy mattress of a bunk-bed that looked like it could snap should somebody set down their rucksack onto it too swiftly, and crying. An Australian nurse in her late ’30s named Jo – who was on the same trip – saw I was upset, sat down next to me and took my hand whilst listening to me talk through what was – in hindsight – a bit of a non-problem in the grand scheme of things, involving lots of mundane detail. She listened patiently, offering support and assurance throughout, before suddenly adopting a more stern demeanour and heading out the door to join the rest of the group:

“Now, get ya shit together!! You won’t get this moment again.“

And maybe, initially, I was quite taken aback by this sudden change of tone and (also a little embarrassed for having blubbered away at somebody I’d only known for two days). But, within minutes I found myself away from the bunk and plunging into the Ottawa River with my fellow travellers, trying to get back into the moment as we all played a game. I remember feeling rejuvenated by Jo’s laid-back attitude, and perspective on what really mattered and what didn’t. What she had said had worked, and transformed the course of my afternoon, shifting my focus back to where it needed to be. It’s worth noting here that those administrative concerns I’d been so worried about were resolved within a few frantic but otherwise non-descript days of phone-calls when back home a few weeks later, to the point where I can’t even remember what the exact problem was, and certainly don’t hold it to the same historic merit that I do the Canada trip. Yet at the time, it had felt massive. Jo’s perspective had been correct.

On the same trip was Dorothea, a lady from the Black Forest – who was again in her late ’30’s – and would sit on the minibus with her earphones in and just do her own thing, laughing at her own jokes – most of which the rest of us didn’t understand – splitting away from the group during most stops, but engaging with us when it mattered, and fundamentally always smiling and being kind. A really calming presence. Hana was a flame-haired lady in her 60’s – also from Germany – who was on the trip having recently become widowed, and wanting to do something a bit special to try and make the best out of a chapter that could easily have been overwhelmed by grief. She was the oldest person on the trip by at least twenty five years but you wouldn’t have been able to tell from the way in which she joined in with everything, especially the wild water rafting! I remember her welcoming smile and state of chill, and also her maternal instincts, which included paying attention to my nutritional needs:

“EatzummorepotatoZophie!” she had once interrupted a story she was telling to snap at me when she noticed I’d finished my lunch, thrusting a foil container of cheesy diced potatoes into my immediate sphere and simultaneously ensuring I fulfilled my potassium quota for the day. It’s funny how some sentences stay etched in your mind for years to come; that one certainly did in mine. I hear it every time I eat potato, and since it’s now been almost eighteen years, I guess I probably always will.

BusDriverJen, a Canadian native from Ontario, had driven us around for much of the trip as our tour-guide, and she too was an energising character. She was so passionate about her work and for us to feel the same levels of enthusiasm for Canada and for its native music – such as Stompin’ Tom Connors‘ ‘Hockey Song’ – that she did. In reality, the most any of us wanted to do with Stompin’ Tom Connors’ after hearing the song for the ten-thousandth time within a day was to throw the CD right out of the window and firmly into the trunk of any single one of the pines we passed on our route so that it would smash into smithereens. Despite this, the enthusiasm had been infectious and inspiring. The Hockey Song is saved onto one of my Spotify playlists and appears every now and then whilst on shuffle mode. I no longer want to fervently chuck it at a tree, even if such a thing were possible. Instead I think about that trip, the long bus journeys, BusDriverJen warbling out, ‘the good ol’ hockey gaaaaaame’ at the wheel in a valiant effort to encourage the rest of us to join in; some apprehensively attempting, and the likes of Dorothea adjusting their headphones and pretending to be fixated by something out of the window so as to avoid having to do so.

Meeting all of these interesting women within the space of a couple of weeks had been an incredibly powerful and marked experience. The volume of independent, explorative women I met on the trip had outnumbered that of men, and that’s not meant as a slight on males, each of the ones I met on the trip had been lovely too. It’s more an acknowledgement of having come across the unexpected, and taking inspiration from it at an impressionable age. Until that point I had only ever heard or read about solo female travellers – never met one myself – yet here they were, dancing to their own headphones in the minibus, calmly responding to intrusive questions about where their husbands were, and defying well-intended yet slightly patronising suggestions on where they should and shouldn’t be going if traveling alone. I remember considering these women in a similar way that you may consider a particularly inspiring teacher in school, when you quietly hope that you might turn out to be a bit like them by the time you reach their age.

At the end of the trip we all went our separate ways. Social media was still to become a real thing back then so instead we’d all exchanged e-mail addresses and vowed to keep in touch that way. Within a few months the e-mails had tapered off and these people I’d come to know so well within those two weeks had faded back into being strangers again, the same ones who’d first stepped onto the minibus and introduced themselves all those months before. In the years that have passed I can’t claim to have thought about them overly often. Life is ever moving and it’s been a very long time. Yet, almost twenty years later, as I sit and really think about it, I see the impact that meeting them had had on me, a planted seed, how in their own ways they had altered what I had thought womanhood was all about back then, that it wasn’t just about x, y and z but about all the other letters of the alphabet too, including solo explorations in a world that had convinced us that as women, we shouldn’t.

That womanhood could be – and is – about absolutely anything you want it to be.

Happy International Women’s Day (for two days ago) to all the inspiring women out there. Keep doing what you do and being true to what you believe in.

Song of the Day: Chantal Kreviazuk – Before You

This seems a pretty appropriate one for the post. This had been another song on BusDriverJen’s CD of Canadian music, but this tune I didn’t mind hearing umpteen times a day. Beautiful song.

THE FEMALE INFLUENCER OF SNOWDONIA

| sophiekemsley

As part of my ongoing love-affair with Snowdonia, I used some of the Christmas break to read a couple of books that were set there. The first was Thomas Firbank’s “I Bought A Mountain”, which is a true story about the author’s experience giving up the corporate world in the 1930’s, moving to North Wales, and turning to a life of farming. Although it sounds idyllic (and actually, not too far removed from some of my own daydreams minus the 1930’s part) the success of the book lies in the rawness of the narrative, an honest account of a complex patchwork including both loss and prosperity, love and tragedy, ignorance and learning and most of all, hard work. As well as all that, there’s a lot of salivating descriptions of gorgeous scenery that effortlessly transports the reader to the subject area.


It was an enjoyable read, but I was much more engaged by the second book, a biography of Esme Kirby, Firbank’s first wife who played a key role in supporting her husband to manage Dyffryn Farm. Among her achievements during this time was setting a new women’s record for conquering the Welsh 3000s, an extremely tough physical challenge which involves reaching all fifteen peaks of over 3000 feet in Wales within 24 hours. Kirby completed it in nine and a half, in 1938, long before the days of protein bars and fancy hiking boots that can assist us with such challenge today.

Incredible as this is, the most inspiring part of her story starts when Firbank sets off to fight in the second world war and decides not to return to Dyffryn, or to Esme, leaving her to choose between a potentially easier, economically stable life away from the likes of sheep shearing and pig selling, or continuing to manage all 3000 acres alone. She chose the latter, and she made it work. To keep financially afloat she rented out the farm and instead lived in a caravan within the grounds. She brushed her teeth and washed her hair in the river, but every now and then would dress herself up for cosy evenings with friends in local hostelries. Her life satisfied her, even if it could be tough to make ends meet.

Kirby was also an ardent conservationist who was extremely passionate about protecting the local landscape from development, and decades of effort in doing so eventually earned her the touching moniker of “Guardian of Snowdonia”. She founded the Snowdonia National Park Society in 1967 after successfully campaigning against the construction of a youth hostel on the Glyder mountains by Dyffryn. The Snowdonia Society, as it is now known, has remained active ever since, and has had a crucial influence on the pleasing visuals we see today, keeping the rivers free of litter and enabling responsible tourism through improved footpath access to mountain ranges, among lots of other things.


Kirby was a very well respected pillar of the local community, but she wasn’t liked by everybody, and some of her decisions were not as popular as others. During her time as Chairperson for the Society she was known to occasionally neglect any notion of consultation when sated by her own staunch beliefs and opinions. She took a hard line against a few development proposals that had the potential to bring greater economic prosperity and job opportunities to the area. In her view, the mountains needed to be left well alone and unspoilt by unnecessary constructions and eyesores. 

Kirby passed away in 1999, some fourteen years before the first Zip World attraction opened creating a new use for the Penrhyn slate quarry, and that’s probably for the best. I don’t think she would have liked it very much, despite the eye-watering £121 million it has pumped into the local economy from people gliding along ziplines in boilersuits, bouncing around on underground trampolines, and meandering through the forest on toboggans.

She may not have got everything quite right – because nobody does – and her leadership skills may have sometimes been lacking, but I am full of admiration for her sense of conviction and devotion to protecting the natural magic of the area she so loved. On top of this, she succeeded in a difficult industry dominated by men (even more so back then). There is something quite ironic about the fact I only came to know of her by reading her first husband’s book, despite being aware of the Snowdonia Society from having pored through one of their fabulous bi-annual magazines one morning last August whilst eating the most syruppy (not a bad thing) French Toast in the legendary Cafe Siabod.

The international, best-selling success of “I Moved A Mountain” should not be apportioned wholly to the author Firbank. For me, it’s Esme who’s the real star of this story, and in an era where the term ‘female influencer’ might be more often attributed to the likes of Kim Kardashian or a random on TikTok who regularly explains the best way to apply lipliner, more people need to know about this one.

Song of the Day: JACK – Try to Arrive Alive

Another gem recommended to me by Spotify! I don’t know too much about this artist but the lyrics are incredibly motivating and at a time where there is so much challenge in the world everyone should listen to it. Cool video too.

A CLAMBER UP THE QUARRY

| sophiekemsley

What would you do if you came across an injured goat on the side of a mountain? Who should you call? What if you don’t have signal, would you just have to leave it?

These were the questions I was pondering to myself one warm August morning earlier in the year whilst ascending the steep, slate inclines of the Dinorwic Slate Quarry in Llanberis, Snowdonia. The air was so still, so silent, that it greatly amplified the sound of a goat bleating coarsely from beyond.

So intrusive to the tranquility was the noise that my immediate thought was that the creature must be in distress, and maybe I could find it and provide some aid. I subsequently pondered over the questions above, and was concerned that I didn’t really know any of the answers.

It was whilst doing this I saw something that would put my mind at rest. On a not too distant peak, I was just about able to make out two fuzzy balls of copper bounding towards one another, bleating recognisable bleats. They had been using their vocals – which were now softening – to find each other, and it had worked. Mystery solved, and thank goodness, because I’m not sure I’d have known what to do if my initial concerns had been realised. I carried on with my walk to the summit.

The day had started off in a strange tone. Until this point, I had spent my Snowdonia trip in the company of loved ones and we had all had a lovely time, but first thing that morning they had returned home and I was suddenly alone. Alone time is never usually a problem for me. As an introverted-extrovert, my energy sources oscillate fairly evenly between company and lack thereof. I need them both at different times. Many of my favourite outdoor adventures have been the ones I’ve had by myself, exploring and getting lost in nature and my favourite music, but this morning, there was that subdued feeling similar to the one you might feel as you chuck bits of popped balloons and food waste into binbags following an enjoyable party, that missing people feeling.

I knew that the best way to respond to this would be to give myself a bit of a mission for the day ahead and I immediately knew what that mission would be – to find the Anglesey Barracks (which, confusingly, are not on Anglesey).

The Anglesey Barracks are a group of granite cottages that were built high in the Dinorwic slate quarry during the 1870’s to serve as homes for those working there, to save the daily commute. One need only look at what remains of them today to know that they didn’t boast the greatest of living standards, even in those more basic of days. Each cottage housed four workers across two small rooms: a communal kitchen space and a shared bedroom. At no point during their occupancy did they have access to electricity so the only source of heat was a fireplace fuelled by coal that they had had to lug up those testing terrains in all weathers. Water needed to be collected from streams, and lack of hygiene and sanitation was a big problem. 

Use of the barracks for housing ceased in the late 1930’s for this reason, and since this time the buildings have been left and reclaimed by nature. It is this, combined with the history, that provides the mystical and intriguing aesthetic that makes them so popular with explorers, historians and photographers. Indeed, I had only come across their existence from an Instagram post, and then a framed photo on the wall in the cottage which we had just been staying in. Although the barracks themselves weren’t widely signposted I could tell from a bit of brief internet research of whereabouts they were, within walking distance from Llanberis, a place I knew fairly well.

I headed towards the Power Station and looked to my left for a footpath that would take me up towards the top of the quarry. It was pretty much where I expected it to be, and so began the steep incline to the top. The first fifteen minutes or so was all about big steps. The ones that make you feel like you’re doing a high-knees HIIT session on repeat. Although towards the end they were getting quite tiring, I also knew that big steps meant big heights, and big heights meant better views. I was excited to clear ‘tree level’ and to reach the steep dark-grey slate paths that wound round the side of the quarry peaks. I knew the barracks couldn’t be too far away, and persevered against the inclines, which were altogether more challenging in the August heat.

The barracks would have been easy to miss. The main footpath takes you only parallel to them for a few brief moments, and they are concealed by both a copse of trees and being lower down than the path itself, accessible by steps. I had reached a bend in the footpath and it was only from this that I noticed the neon jacket of a fellow explorer 140 degrees to my right, stood in the centre of the historic residential street. 

The sights did not disappoint, feeling every bit as intriguing as they had seemed on screen, but looking most definitely smaller than what I had been expecting (and I certainly hadn’t expected them to be spacious). I carried on walking through ‘streets’ that would have once seen heavy footfall every day but today only had a couple of prints, those of neon jacket guy, and mine. It was humbling to observe.


There were more cottages around the corner. These ones seemed to have experienced an even greater reclamation from nature. Mossy green branches protruded out of what were once bedroom windows, roots had broken into the foundations leading to piles of collapsed slate everywhere, and there were certainly no roofs on any of them. The exposed remains of a lone cottage sat slightly closer to the edge of the ridge and afforded a great panoramic, the perfect place to eat my ham sandwich. I sat for a while looking out towards Yr Wyddfa and though from here I couldn’t see a single soul on the mountain I knew that up close it would be teeming with hundreds of hikers striving for the summit, like ants crawling an anthill. I gave myself time to absorb the moment. Yes, I was still feeling some dregs of loneliness, but what a stunning place to be (and what a fit sandwich to be eating too, I seem to recall that one was particularly good).

Fuelled up on protein, fibre and a rush of adrenaline from the views I continued my ascent up the winding slate path to the top of the quarry. It was during this stint that I heard the not-so-distressed goats, and also saw a few others, such as this pair, which studied me intensely as I approached:


I couldn’t get over the fact they had actual horns, just like the ones found in storybooks. Fittingly, they seemed to disappear the closer you got, leaving you wondering if they’d even be real or just an illusion catalysed by the drop in air pressure from the rising altitudes.

I eventually reached the quarry peak, which somehow reminded me of a cross between the surface of the moon and the American West, not that I know either of those well. There were clear signs of human activity, not least from signage warning of electrical currents, yet very few actual humans about. Everything about it felt other worldly, and I enjoyed wandering aimlessly for a while, in awe of the sheer size of the expanse. 

A man-made pier-like structure led out to a viewpoint, at the end of which somebody had recently attached a bouquet of flowers in poignant memory of a loved one. This must have been a special place to the departed and as I once again took in the panoramic I could completely understand why. I admired the dedication of their loved one for keeping the bouquet so intact during what it is a steep and testing climb, and imagine it brought them some solace to place it there.

It’s hard not to fall massively in love with this part of the world. It’s not the best kept secret, but neither is it a full front-page spread. The perfect balance, maybe.

I looked down over the village of Llanberis, where I had checked into my bunkhouse a few hours previously, and was surprised to see it now looking like a small blur, a good time to start my descent perhaps.

The goats were fine, my mission had been achieved, and it was time for a curry and a pint of Snowdonian IPA.

A COFFEE IN 1950’S SOUTH EAST LONDON

| sophiekemsley

“Oh no, it’s no good, I can’t decide between the jacket potato or the panini…”

My attention was roused. Somebody nearby was experiencing a menu-related dilemma and I needed to hear the conclusion. What was it about the jacket potato that was creating doubt? Or, were they simply in more of a mood for bread? Were they going to opt for tuna, or cheese and beans?! I needed to know, and decided to take a pause from the various bits of life admin arithmetic I was scrolling out in my trusty green notebook so that I could listen in and find out.

It was a beautifully hot and sunny Wednesday afternoon in September and I was sat in a pondside pavilion cafe in a bustling and beautiful South London park. As much as people may malign London for being what they perceive to be a giant sprawl of dark concrete, little gems like this help to showcase how green it actually is. There’s a very good reason why it became the world’s first national park city in 2019, and as I take in the landscape around me, I’m full of appreciation for just how much brighter and emerald-like the biodiversity is when juxtaposed against the beige and greys of the ’60’s architecture on the other side of the railings. In many ways, it makes it sweeter.

I’ve plonked myself here because I full-on fancied the shade from the parasols – although – a particularly strong coffee has undone some of the remedial work and a light-headed feeling has come over me. I’m going to be here for a while, so the notebook has come out to accompany my pondside repose.

It’s hard to focus at first. On the table to my left are two screaming babies and their mothers’ ensconced in loud chat about irregular feeding times, toilet trips and somebody else’s “disastrous” engagement party. I’m somewhat relieved when they leave, because the sudden vacancy of sound amplifies the conversation to my right.

It’s this party of people, four older ladies (including the one in a quandary about what to order) who captivate my attention.

Once they have been served their lunches (with jacket potatoes prevailing, by the way), they perform grace. I’m not sure I can remember the last time I heard anybody say grace. It may not even have been within the last two decades, so this really stands out. The lady leading it pays particular homage to “our Tom, looking down and with us in spirit.”

“I really appreciated that part. Thank you so much.” says a lady in a green top and a headband who gives away her name several times during ensuing conversations, but let’s just call her ‘Dorothy’ for now. It becomes clear that she is recently widowed, and that she was very much in love with Tom.

Of the four ladies, it is Dorothy who speaks the most. There is a sense that these ladies go back a very long way, but also that there is a lot about each other they’ve still to learn. Dorothy talks at length about growing up in south east London – in Brixton to be precise – and how six people would routinely share a bed in their family home. Money was very tight back then, Dorothy explains, so much so that by the end of the week, she and her family would often be making a dinner out of bread dipped in gravy (I guiltily acknowledge my thought that this actually sounds quite appealing to me).

This part of the conversation prompts a lively discussion about today’s youth. Each of the ladies agree, that young people today “have it so much easier in comparison”. As somebody without children, who – at this point – is hearing a child in the background wailing loudly about not getting an ice-cream, I find myself inclined to agree, on the back of what I’ve just heard. But then I recall being a young person myself and hearing older generations say similar things back then, too, and they were never particularly helpful comments to hear and nor did I think they were right. In truth, I don’t think any generation has – or had it – harder than anyone else, instead I just feel that different times present different challenges.

Having said that, it’s hard not to feel a real admiration for these ladies and their experiences in life. Dorothy tells a fascinating story about how an older cousin she had growing up turned out to be her sister. The mother had been very young when she first gave birth, so her parents – Dorothy’s grandparents – brought her first child up as their own. It is hard not to notice the parallels with a particularly famous Eastenders storyline, and it is absolutely fascinating. The two ‘cousins’ grew apart over the years and only reconnected after Dorothy researched the family tree. This was the point at which the truth of the relationship surfaced, sadly long after the death of the sisters’ mother. Dorothy and her sister didn’t speak overly often, but would always send one another a Christmas card.

There is a lot of talk around family units and – in particular – the role of the patriarchy in 1950’s south-east London. A story is shared which illustrates this perfectly:

“She would prepare his suit every Friday, so that he could wear it to the social club on Saturday. She’d send her little daughter, Jackie, to the laundrette in Camberwell Green to collect it. One time when she was running this errand, little Jackie was struck by a car, and when the Police broke the news to her mum, she just replied, ‘But what about his suit?’ “

Another lady at the table talks about her grandparents. Nan and grandad. They never went on holiday together, because they didn’t actually like each other, but they stayed together:

“People did in those days, women were too financially dependent on their husbands to leave.”

“The husbands would sometimes leave the wives, though. My husband’s granny… her husband left her with nothing and she had to put the two boys into a home because she couldn’t afford them. People seem to think that kind of thing didn’t happen in those days, but it did. And then there were the workhouses, that’s where a lot of them ended up…”

Workhouses. A well-known characteristic of Victorian-era Britain in which those unable to support themselves financially would spend 12 hours a day carrying out the most monotonous and grueling labour, like breaking stones and crushing bones to extract the fertiliser, in exchange for a roof over their head, albeit a very cramped one with residents consisting mostly of the elderly and sick.

Though I maintain that different times present different challenges, I’m hugely relieved these things were abolished long ago.

After a fascinating fifteen minutes within this south east London time portal, the conversation shifts back to the present. They’re about to head off. They pull out their phones and share despondence that none of them have received any messages, except for Red Top, she’s had twelve, but most of those are from ‘Carol in the group chat‘. And there are some new pilates classes coming to the centre that they feel will be just as popular as the chair yoga, but it’s the impending electronic bingo machines that really excite Dorothy.

I feel so sad when they leave.

People often speak of eavesdropping like it’s a dirty thing to do. I’ll agree, there are times when it’s clearly not appropriate. But, in comparison to the talk of nappy habits and disastrous engagement parties that made my initial coffee a slightly testing experience, I know which conversation I’d prefer to overhear. I don’t think it does us any harm to sometimes sit and listen to people who we may never otherwise get to meet, to hear their stories and thoughts, to learn about different lives in different times. Different struggles, different joys.

As the ladies leave they excitedly remark about a heron on the opposite side of the algae-strewn pond:

“There he is, in his usual place!”

Thank you for letting me stay for this short and most memorable while in yours.

10,000 DAYS OF DIARIES

| sophiekemsley

This is my collection of personal diaries, which are kept in a fire-proof box at my parents’ house. There is one for every year since 1996, and every single day’s entry has been completed in full, meaning around 10,000 days have been recorded among them. This only meant a few lines per day for the first four years, before an A5 page a day from 2000 onwards (I had no idea what to do with all that additional space to start with, but made it my mission to fill it up somehow, and once I’d started with that, didn’t want to break the sequence). I was inspired to start keeping a diary by my mum, who has religiously kept a diary for decades too.

My diary collection is one of my most valuable and precious material possessions. They are deeply personal, but I’ve often been happy to share excerpts with friends and family upon request, particularly the more historic they become! Many of their own memories are captured in there too, and often this includes things they had long forgotten about. As well as being an outlet for me each day, this is one of the diaries’ most important purposes. They ensure the preservation of special moments, special people and special things. Of course, there’s a lot of not so nice or more mundane moments stored in them too, but even those help serve perspective when reading them back.

Back in January 1999 I was incredibly upset about the fact my group of school friends had had a falling out, because there were more of us than there were members in the band Steps, and this meant not everybody could take part in the talent show performance, leading to some people feeling left out, and arguments occurring. We laugh about it now. In 2001, a classmate borrowed my felt pens but didn’t put the lids back on after using them, and the nibs dried out. I’ve deliberately selected some of the silliest examples here to help illustrate a point, but still I look back and realise how fortunate I was that things like that represented my biggest concerns. Life before mortgages and MOTs.

A couple of years later I was scribing grumbles about having to go and visit my grandparents after a night of one too many cider ‘n’ blacks. And you know how it goes; I obviously read that back too and think about how much I’d love just to have the option to visit them now. Then there are frustrating accounts of entire days being too busy playing Mario Kart or chatting on MSN to complete an application to something that I’m fairly sure I would have loved to do. Unlocking Rainbow Road and discussing plans for a night out felt way more important at the time. There were far too many daylight hours at University that were spent sleeping or eating instant noodles, and not enough trips to the Lakes. I spent a whole afternoon of my 2010 Indonesia stint ferrying around the city trying to find somewhere to access the internet just so that I could read some emails that I can’t even remember who sent them now or if I even had any at all.

In the more recent years, the contrast isn’t quite as extreme. Progressively throughout adulthood we learn a bit more about who we are, and what our values are. I stopped having entire days in front of computer games many, many years ago (though I do still shamelessly enjoy the odd bit of Mario Kart!) and though it probably would still irritate me if somebody caused my pens to dry out by neglecting to replace the lids, I doubt I’d consider it noteworthy enough to scribe into my personal history anymore. But that said, there are still things I read back on that seemed like such a big deal at the time and now seem like nothing, and it’s always so interesting to see that.

Making the most of any given day and realising not to sweat the small stuff are two of the biggest things that keeping a daily diary has taught me, and I think those are two lessons that I’m happy to re-learn over and over from every single page.

One day I hope these books will be useful to somebody else too; how that’ll happen I’m not really sure, but even if they just give some descendants something to read for a bit and laugh over then I guess that’ll be something.

Song of the Day: Yamar – Dry Bread

A nice, Summery toe-tapper of a tune with Caribbean infusions.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bx9P5lW2c5M

THE MYSTERY BOX

| sophiekemsley

My microwave blew up the other month.

It was all very chaotic.

The turntable was smashed to smithereens, the food inside splattered everywhere and – perhaps worst of all – lunch was completely lost. A bowl of soup now fodder for the kitchen bin. Serves me right for cooking it the lazy way, I guess.

After fooling myself for about three hours that I could manage life without a microwave I succumbed to ordering a replacement, and for a somewhat halcyon period after it arrived, all seemed right and merry with the world again.

But joy eventually turned to despair when this new microwave too, started going a bit crazy. After a few weeks, it would turn on by itself and start rotating about, as though a ghostly apparition was in my kitchen heating up a big bowl of invisible ghost food. Now I may come from a family that loves to eat, but I couldn’t think of any of my dearly departed relatives who would choose to re-emerge just to use a microwave. Many of them spent their whole lives without a microwave for god’s sake.

No. The somewhat less exciting reality was that my new microwave had a known manufacturing fault and needed to be returned, but the explanation behind the plight of the microwave is not the point of this post.

The point of this post is to showcase examples of the hidden impacts from what can sometimes seem like trivial, insignificant things.

To cut out a long and really boring bit of detail, I needed to post my microwave off within the next few hours to be able to get my refund, as I was only a couple of days from the end of the Return period. Taking it to the Post Office was no problem, but securely packaging it was. In all the joy and merriment of receiving my new microwave, and to save space in my flat, I’d thrown away the original box, which just so happened to be absolutely massive and tricky to replace.

I visited a number of shops to try and buy a replacement box so that I could hurriedly ship Micky M II back to Amazon in time, but nowhere sold ones anywhere large enough. I went to almost every shop in town to see if they had any boxes they wanted to shift, but it seemed I was out of luck.

A supermarket on the outskirts of town was my final hope and by that point, I had explained my request so many times that I was spluttering out my words with the same complete lack of panache as a faulty microwave launching lunch all over its insides.

“Hi, errere bleurghy bleh looking microwave box” – or so I’m sure it sounded.

The gem of a lady on the Customer Service desk politely endured my incoherence and disappeared for what seemed like quite a long time. She returned with a massive cardboard box that to my delight, was not only the size I was after but had also once been a receptacle for packs of Roast Beef Monster Munch. She explained that it had taken a while because she had needed to shelve its contents first.

After offering my profuse thanks, I took my box to the Post Office and had a long date with some sellotape and bubble wrap before posting my faulty item off forever.

Though it may sound extreme, I’m fairly convinced that by going out of her way to help somebody who wasn’t even a customer in supplying a surplus to requirements box, this lady saved me £80. There was no way I was going to be able to get the item sent off in time if not. So whilst she may have felt she was providing me with something of very little meaning or value, the hidden context – that she wasn’t aware of – meant that actually, she really was.

It made me think more generally about acts of kindness and how what may seem like small gestures can have a massive meaning and impact that we won’t necessarily ever get to know about. I am (fortunately) not £80 away from being bankrupt, but what if I had been? In these challenging economic times, it’s clearly not an amount people can just throw away.

In the town I live we have a thriving freecycling and sharing community where people give items they no longer need or want to people who do. It’s a wonderful initiative that is becoming country-wide and I’d love to see the impacts of the exchanges looked at in further detail, and hear the stories behind them. A top that no longer fits one person that may make another feel like a million dollars. An old karaoke set that was taking up space in somebody’s lounge and then brought a surprise form of entertainment to another family’s Saturday night. Functional stuff like food or USB cables that made somebody else’s day that little bit easier.

What might be of little value or seem a small gesture to some, can have massive meaning for somebody else.

Sometimes what’s in the box is much more than meets the eye. A true mystery box.

Song of the Day: Tears for Fears – My Girls (cover of Animal Collective)

The experimental music of 21st century US act Animal Collective may not to be to everybody’s taste (though it definitely is mine). But then how better to make a tune appeal to the masses than by drafting in a well loved ’80’s pop band to make a cover of it that sounds akin to something that would manage to get everyone – without exception – on the dancefloor. This cover sounds exactly how you might anticipate it would and it’s awesome.

THE TALKING TATE

| sophiekemsley

I’m not usually one for an art gallery. If you were to plonk me in a random city and ask me to pick from a list of local attractions, I’d prioritise: a) anything that involves moving on water, b) anything that involves interesting food, or c) anything that will make my ears happy and my legs want to dance. I don’t think you can usually do any of these things in an art gallery (but if you can, please tell me about it!)

The Tate Modern is one of the UK’s most famous art galleries and I have been twice throughout my entire life. Once with a couple of friends (all I have is a fleeting memory of something we were chatting about as we descended an escalator), and once when I needed to quickly make use of the facilities whilst drinking from the pop-up places on the South Bank. I have often heard and read about how wonderful this place is supposed to be, yet I’ve probably never really embraced it properly. I love the concept of art, but mostly as written or musical forms as opposed to static ones. When it comes to the prospect of art galleries, I just don’t always get them.

On a recent day off work, I was in London with some time to spare and thought I should try and broaden my horizons by making a proper visit – alone – without the distraction of catch-up chats with friends going on in parallel, and with the time to move around on my own terms. To read what I wanted to read. To pass by what I wanted to pass by.

I ended up covering every square meter of the Tate within about 50 minutes (the recommended visiting time is 3-4 hours). I guess I just don’t have the sort of brain which is always receptive to what I’m sure are genius feats of creativity. During my trip, I was confronted by: some fluffy drapes hanging from the ceiling in the entrance hall that resembled something from the dodgy Ghost Train at Cassiobury Park funfair in the 1990’s, Cezanne’s paintings of a few discoloured apples that looked like something from a yellow-sticker haul, and a picture frame sculpted into the wall that just looked like somebody made a mistake with a chisel then tried to make it look intentional by completing the rectangle shape. Each of these things are no doubt way better than any ‘art’ I could produce and I mean no disrespect to the artists, but they just didn’t make me feel anything at all.

But, there were a few exhibits which really did make me stop, stare and think. Tracey Moffatt’s ‘Up in the Sky’ collection of photographs designed to capture indigenous and non-indigenous lives intertwined in a deprived town in the Australian outback, Martha Rosler’s representations of American airports as channels of the human body and transience of life, then this one, Cildo Meirele’s ‘Babel 2001‘:

It’s a tower comprising of 800 vintage radio sets ranging from the oldest at the bottom, to more modern ones at the top. They are all playing at the same time; different frequencies, at only slightly different volumes. “No two experiences of this work are ever the same”, reads one of the only exhibit descriptions I have ever been interested enough to read in full.
And that’s entirely the point of it. Meireles’ exhibit aims to remind us that as soon once we reach information overload, communication fails. Read one hundred random facts and you’ll maybe remember ten percent of them. Read three and you’ll probably remember one hundred percent.

Out of 800 radio sets that were all playing at once; I could only really recognise one song, an ’80’s number I never remember the name of. There were dozens of voices, but I couldn’t make out what any of them saying. A friend of mine went to the same exhibit a few days later and heard something else entirely. I found the whole thing incredibly clever, and very powerful. When one person speaks you’ll hear every word but when everybody is doing so at once, in different frequencies but similar volumes, nobody really gets heard, and that’s a shame.

We live in an age where technology has advanced so much, even since 2001 when this work was completed. The parameters of choice have become so broad, that we’re far less likely to be hearing or seeing the same things anymore. I have previously written about the impact of the likes of Freeview and streaming services on the day to day chats we used to have about television, but it doesn’t end there. These methods of communication and entertainment are designed to make our lives better and our minds more informed but I’m not always entirely sure that they do.

The more we have of something, do we still make the most of each individual component? Do we really remember each episode we’ve watched if we’ve binge-watched several series? Each book we’ve read if we’ve almost exhausted the Library? Or each stereo we listened to if there were 800 to choose from? Does knowing that we can pretty much find out anything we want to know within minutes thanks to the internet make us really feel more intelligent as a society or does it only make us set a higher bar for ourselves? I remember sitting in front of the computer in my early ’20’s, fresh out of Uni with no idea what to do next, knowing that in the hidden corners of the internet right before me I could probably find an opportunity that would change my life or kick-off my career, but feeling slightly pressured by that same knowledge, and simply having no idea where to start looking. I think I searched for a bit of advice, only to find dozens of people sharing a billion contrasting opinions that only added to the confusion, and ended up giving up and looking up recipes for interesting curries instead.

Among the vintage radios forming Babel, I recognised the Sony stereo that accompanied my school homework and thought back to the days when you couldn’t simply skip a song you didn’t enjoy, only manually fast forward. And though something like Spotify would have seemed the stuff of dreams back then, I felt some nostalgia for the days when you’d just have to listen to a song regardless, and would often grow to like it in time. We are very lucky with what we have now but there is definitely something to be said for keeping it simple, too.

I left the Tate, bought a coffee, and spent some time thinking about what I’d just seen. I then realised what I was doing, and acknowledged taking a step closer to realising what all the fuss about art galleries is about 😉

(But seriously, if you know of an art gallery on a speed boat, that serves unusual world grub and plays Weezer as you walk around please let me know)

Song of the Day: The Shins – The Great Divide (Flipped)

This is the sort of anthemic song you feel should have been around for years, but in reality it’s only a couple of years old. It’s just lovely. That is all.

“Ooh, the blind
Collective mind of man is all they’re offering
Then you bring a breath of life out of the emptiness
Your hand in mine, oh-oh-oh (your hand in mine)

The great divide”

GOAT TO THE MOUNTAINS

| sophiekemsley

If there’s one thing I don’t like so much about the Kent landscape (which I will otherwise wax lyrical about) it’s that it’s a little bit too flat.
I probably shouldn’t complain about that too much, because if it wasn’t then we’d all have to perform hill-starts more regularly, and would probably have slipped over countless more times in this past, particularly icy week. Plus, I can still feel my heart crunch when I recall younger times trying to carry my weekly grocery shop up a particularly steep alleyway in Lancaster that always felt as challenging to conquer as I imagined the ascending travelator on Gladiators would (the sausage roll and fags diet probably didn’t help with that, mind).
Either way, when you’re used to living in a county which is predominately flat – albeit beautiful – it’s easy to forget just how massively diverse the landscape is across the rest of the UK. Only in relatively recent years have I really started to realise and appreciate this; and because to get to these places requires resources which we don’t always have spare, it makes any opportunity to see them that little bit more precious.
I was absolutely stunned by Snowdonia when a close friend who grew up there first showed me around her home, to the extent where it seemed hard to believe that it shares the same island as the likes of the M25. Fresh air, clear water, wild ponies roaming around in heather-topped hills, and other mesmerising panoramics, were in abundance, and the best thing is that they were all free to see, and get completely lost in. As a bit cringe as the saying may sound, Snowdonia is an area that truly feeds the soul and I try to return whenever I can for some ‘lunch’. Every time I go, I realise I have still only seen a small fraction of it. My friend says that she often wished there had been more for young people in North Wales to do whilst she was growing up – more cinema complexes and McDonalds like we had plenty of in Watford – and I tell her that I often wished I’d had mountains and lakes nearby, instead of concrete consumerism and pollution. I always sucked at bowling anyway.

Both of us craving mountains over the Christmas break – but with North Wales seeming too far for the time we had – on New Years’ Eve we decided to visit the Peak District for a day, another area which I know shamefully little about and had only visited once previously. We spent the afternoon walking up Mam Tor – a route recommended by Much Better Adventures – and from the peak looked out at a huge expanse of land consisting of multiple counties of northern England. We also read a bit about the famous caves – some of which were still inhabited at the turn of the 20th century – and found out about the limestone quarries the area is famous for. It was a very wet, windy and slippery day (made more challenging by the fact neither of us were wearing the right shoes) but the harsh gradients enabled us to give our legs a good stretch so that by the time we eventually got back to the car – covered in mud and exhausted – we felt deserving and ready for some stodgy food at the pub. It had been a good workout and an even better exploration of some dramatic yet beautiful – and completely new to us – scenery. Well worth the four hour drive.

We weren’t there for long but it was enough time to make a big impression. I have been thinking about it a lot since, and have many daydreams about going back and seeing more of it. And so, since it’s January and a time to traditionally look ahead, I suppose it’s reasonable to state the following: I have absolutely no idea what assortment of good, bad or bizarre things 2023 may conjure up but as long as it features some hills and mountains, that’s okay 😉

Song the Day: Mikron – Lyre

Feeling electronica at the moment! This is a nice chilled piece from a duo of Irish brothers. One of those songs you can file away in ‘perfect for driving at night or working to’.