Ramblers
My Ramblers
The Baton passes through Cardiff
In April the 75th anniversary baton passed through Cardiff. The Ramblers is celebrating its 75th birthday this year and is holding celebratory walks through England and Wales.
Watch the walk on Youtube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3nigA1myxI
Ramblers Cymru on Youtube: www.youtube.com/ramblerscymru
Ramblers celebrate anniversary of Kinder Scout trespass
On 24 April 2010 walkers from Greater Manchester Ramblers groups and Get Walking Keep Walking celebrated the Ramblers 75th by taking to the top of Kinder Scout on the anniversary of the 1932 mass trespass. Watch the video on YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=WH6DtJN4SHM
"I am pleased and proud to be a Get Walking Keep Walking volunteer"
In the summer of 2008, I received a letter from the Ramblers asking if I was interested in becoming a volunteer for Get Walking Keep Walking (GWKW) in Manchester. I found out some more about it and decided that it would be a worthwhile thing to do and as I was recently retired, I had some time to devote to it.
"You want to get the Birmingham factory lads and lassies out in your beautiful countryside..."
As a contribution to the 75th anniversary celebrations, Michael Bird has produced a book on the history of the Ramblers Midland Area ('The Midland Area of the Ramblers’ Association 1930-1987'). This free to download document has a lot of revealtions about the rambling movement, as the below extracts reveal.
"If people volunteer, they will care more about the walking environment.”
As press officer for the London Metropolitan Walkers 20s to 30s Group, Eleanor Harris has seen membership double through innovative volunteer recruitment schemes.
“New volunteers and members are the lifeblood of London Met Walkers and we entice them in every way we can,” says Eleanor. “Our ‘themed walks’ programme gained us new members this autumn, as hundreds turned out for the London Film Festival-timed ‘film location’ walks. We’ve also attended events like the Thames Festival (attracting crowds of 750,000), and printed a publicity leaflet for new members.
"We owe so much to Joan for devoting her life to the Ramblers.”
Name: Joan Deacon
Current role: Ramblers Isle of Wight volunteer
Length of service: 42 years
Joan co-founded the Ramblers Isle of Wight group in 1967 after becoming disheartened by the neglect of the path network on the Island. Clearing barbed wire from routes, reinstating ploughed or overgrown paths, Joan re-established a comprehensive network of paths and bridleways. By working alongside the local authority, approximately 530 miles of rights of way were added to the definitive map – and thus protected under law. By the 1980s a usable network was becoming a reality and so Joan set about promoting it by writing the first of her trilogy of walking guides to the Island. Since then copies have run to 60,000. Joan would always revise these booklets herself, updating changes to the path network, until she was diagnosed with IBM (inclusion body myositis) which meant she could not walk as far. Yet she is still very much involved in protecting rights of way; most recently working on the Ramblers coastal access campaign, to ensure a protected coastal route around the whole of England. Joan has been a group secretary and served on the Ramblers Wessex Area Committee for many years, and is still representing the Isle of Wight at the age of 73.
"The team goes out rain or shine and it’s a really good laugh."
Name: Bob Berry MBE
Current role: Footpath Work Officer, Mendip Ramblers
Length of service: 8 years
Biggest achievement: In 2002 Bob set up the Mendip Footpath Working Party. The 12-strong party works parish by parish clearing paths, building bridges and repairing stiles. They celebrate the end of each project with a public walking festival, which 300 people attended this year. The Party erected 13 kissing gates along the path from Shepton Mallet to Dalton School. Bob was awarded an MBE for his role.
"In 1937 I joined the Ramblers..."
In 1936, I was a member of the YHA and working in the City of London. It was though this work that I met Ernest Welsman, a staff member of the Ramblers Association.
In 1937 I joined the Southern Pathfinders and the Ramblers Association – and still have my ‘RA’ badge! From 1939-1946 I was not able to walk in the UK. However I did have opportunities during a three-month stay in Cape Town, en route to India. I did plenty of walking in Assam and Ceylon (Sri Lanka) between June 1943 and March 1946, as well as a fortnight in Darjeeling in the Himalayas.
"Walking and volunteering have become a way of life"
Name: David Clark
Current role: Walks Organiser, London Blind Ramblers
Length of service: 10 years
Biggest achievement: David has tripled walk attendances over the last decade by organising follow-up calls, events, and the club’s four weekends away each year. He says that these events have "transformed London Blind Ramblers from a walks programme into a social club.” The number of sighted Ramblers’ Groups involved has also increased from 20 to 30.
"I enjoy ensuring the public’s rights are protected and not stolen from us"
Name: Kate Ashbrook
Current role: Footpath Secretary of Buckinghamshire, Milton Keynes and West Middlesex Area
Biggest achievement: getting the infamous ‘Hoogstraten’ footpath reopened
Kate has been a trustee of the Ramblers for 27 years, and was elected at her first general council in 1982, aged 27. In 1986 she became footpath secretary of Bucks, Milton Keynes and West Middlesex Area.
