Miles Richardson @findingnature has written about the feeling of helplessness of those engaged in the effort to protect nature. Another 3 fires on the bit of countryside i voluntarily help look after. The first of these involved my colleagues being verbally abused and physically threatened. The last one only came to light this morning – another colleage finding a picnic bench at Curbar smashed and burnt.
To use the Army phraseology, ‘it boils my piss’.
Elsewhere in the Peak at least 5 wildfires raged. It’s almost not worth the effort. Or risk. It’s past ‘whack-a-mole’ and more akin to trying to move the Pyramids with a snapped plastic spoon.
What would Alf Peacock do ?
I threw a leg over my bike. Huffed and puffed up some hills against a headwind. Bottled it on some steep loose gravel. Got off and pushed. Made a 3in1 on a tiny bridge over the Porter. Swooped down some lanes to find my way blocked by an escape party of ewes. Made some ridiculous noises and they turned and headed back from whence they came. Messaged the local farmers group and the farmer was there in <5 mins (much to the disappointment of the ewes). Three girls that were out walking the lanes said ‘well done …how did you know what noises to make ?’. Just call me The Cycling Shepherd™️
I did whatsapp an apology afterwards in case any farmers had seen me in my lycra 🫣🫣🫣🫣
I then swooped down the remaining lanes having an on-bike-disco-for-one to Le Freak by Chic.
How many kilometres warrants a toasted teacake ? asking for a friend.
Equilibrium gained. Back out as a ‘snapped plastic spoon’ at dusk.
Having a lovely time in the Peak. Me and some mates stopped by this mint viewpoint last night and had a barbecue and smashed up the picnic table and set fire to it. Loads of laughs. Mint night. Dancing like a dick and went and lost me diabetes tag thingy in the fire. Can you get us another off temu ? Ta.
When you get hyper-focused on people causing harm to the landscape in the dark hours it’s a joy to be proven wrong.
After being out with my @eastern_moors_partnership colleagues detecting and extinguishing campfires last night, i was on my way home when i noticed lights on Burbage Moor after 11.30pm.
Out of the dark came 4 people. Due to the fact that they were all carrying and using paper maps and compass i presumed they were time-travellers from yesteryear.
Turns out it was @oli.outdoors teaching night nav on a Hill & Moorland Leader course
Many of the outdoor activity instructors in the Peak also provide a valuable network of eyes and noses keeping a look out for fire in the @peakdistrictnationalpark. It just so happens that Oli called one in on the @peakdistrictnt Longshaw Estate the other day.
P.S. i wonder if those paper map thingys will ever become fashionable again 🧐
The act of camping on land that is not yours and where you do not have permission from the landowner / landmanager is, in law, a civil matter of trespass.
For every fire and whatnot that appears on my socials and on my blog (that the Eastern Moors Partnership team have found) there are dozens and dozens of friendly conversations with campers that are, in law, committing trespass but, after a chat with a ranger and there being no evidence of fire or intent to have one, they’re left in -situ to enjoy a leave-no-trace night in their tent, hammock or bivvy.
However, once you light a fire you are in effect damaging the land upon which you are trespassing. That is a criminal matter. Once the risk from the fire has been extinguished you will be ‘invited’ to leave and not return for 72 hrs. Rangers are allowed to tell you to leave. Most people do because otherwise the police are called and it gets messy.
But i would like to raise an important point (which reared its head again this evening). Whatever excuse you give us for being unable to leave is not going to wash. You came to this landscape and lit a fire. The rangers neither invited you nor asked you to light it. So, being too drunk to drive, being under the influence of drugs, being tired, being with small kids, being miles from home, not having money for the bus, having a medical issue or begging us to stay and promising that you won’t light the fire once we’ve left …. none of these will wash. We’ve heard hundreds of excuses. Light a fire or have the clear intent to do so and it’s adieu. Cheerio. Auf Wiedersehen, Pet
You’re going. You’re not being allowed to stay because it’s your kids first big adventure camping out with fire. Perhaps you ought to have read the National Park website or the BMC wildcamping advice before bringing them.
That position stands for everybody.
Oh, and fire neither knows nor cares how well you made it. We don’t let people that think they made a ‘really safe fire’ stay whilst asking others to leave. Nope.
And the second point is (generally speaking) you can’t walk down the High Street carrying an axe. Or a bush saw. Or a folding saw. It is an offence (except for a few clearly defined purposes). So on the off chance that either South Yorkshire or Derbyshire police officers are out on patrol with us and they find you in the woods under Millstone with a chuffin’ big axe (or other implement designed for felling or chopping wood), you’re facing something far far more serious than being asked to leave the woods. Have a read of Sections 139 and 139A of the Criminal Justice Act 1988.
If you’re a really experienced woodland skills / forest schools instructor you probably ought to know that you need permission to light fire in woodland (and you’re almost certainly not getting permission in the Peak), and the rules around axes.
We try to be helpful. We’re almost all volunteers. The legislation on fires in the landscape is easily accessible. Read it. Please don’t try to bargain with us. And if in our fire patrols we find items that are ‘illegal carry’ in law, we take that very seriously indeed.
Two large campfires in bone dry woodland tonight. The first of which the Fire&Rescue Service had been out looking for, before we found it with the drone.
Another midnight finish for the team.
Large swathes of the Peak District and Pennines have suffered wildfires today. Don’t be a dick.
It was almost as if the sky was trying to tell us something ….. Millstone Edge from Surprise View 1945hrs Easter Sunday 2026
Experience made us twitch. A quiet Friday night and Storm Dave on Saturday left us expecting a busy Sunday.
We was right we was …
Early evening glimpses of groups walking in to woodland. Two fires in BoleHill / Lawrencefield before 9pm. NT Longshaw Rangers dealt with the second of these.
This was the third night that we have had Damian (the new BMC funded Wildfire Engagement Officer) out with us. As his patch includes the Stange North Lees Estate he was taken on a ‘Stanage By Night’ tour and quite quickly saw 2 vehicles parked on moorland near Dennis Knoll and then found and dealt with 5 people having a fire in the woodland. They were invited to leave and the fire site extinguished.
As we were heading back along under Stanage (and Damian headed off at the end of his full shift) we noticed lights in the top of the Plantation. The drone quickly confirmed a fire there
and then detected a second fire along Stanage Edge.
When told by drone to extinguish the Edge fire the bright sparks that had lit it decided to kick the lit logs off the Edge and in to the bracken moorland below. Bright people. DFRS were called and a joint patrol sent out to find the logs (helped by the thermal drone) and soaked them.
Red circle marks the heat signature off one of the logs kicked down on to the moor. Using the drone feed to decide on a plan of actionOne of several logs
Summary of 4th fire
We all then moved along to the Plantation fire site, invited those 5 to leave (they stated that despite the nearby presence of a DFRS fire engine and car and being spoke to by Rangers via the drone) that our response was ‘all just a prank’, and hadn’t moved at all in the preceding 90 minutes. They too were invited to leave. We then soaked that fire site.
Summary of 5th fire
Five fires in total. Four of these were in dry old woodland and had the potential to cause large fires therein. The other saw lit logs kicked down on to dead bracken – again with the potential to cause fire in the landscape.
‘Only when you drink from the river of life shall you indeed sing. And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb. And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance’
I have been lucky enough to attend a few of the Arc’teryx Academy events. In 2023 i went to the Alpine Academy in Chamonix.
The little group i was in for the week was guided by @freddegoulet and @benjaminribeyre .
As often on this kind of compressed learning experience one hangs off the shirt tails of immense experience and just tries to soak up every tip, tactic and titbit of advice.
Almost three years later i only really have one resounding memory of that trip. It was lunchtime on the Tuesday. I was sat on the moraine on the Mer de Glace chatting to Benji. In about fifteen minutes he went very very deep in to the ying and yang of being a Guide earning a living from people (like me) flying to the alps to gawp at the immense shrinkage of the glaciers and the collapse of the high alpine environment whilst literally being the causation. He gesticulated it blowing his brain. The irony deeply troubled him. Benji wondered what would be left of the high alpine when his young son Milo was his age.
That conversation has gnawed at me ever since.
Benji was killed on Tuesday in an accident whilst guiding a client in the Ecrins Massif.
‘Mountains are not fair or unfair, they are just dangerous’ – Reinhold Messner
There is a GoFundMe appeal (for ‘Benjamin Ribeyre’) set up to support Benji’s wife Erin and their son Milo. Please support it if you have the means.
🙏.
Benji and Fred making the supremely difficult look like a walk in the park.
I dug the bike out of the back of the garage just now
She’s called Geraldine (she has her own Insta account at @theadventuresofgeraldine albeit nowt has gone on there for millenia ). Tyres were flat. Tubeless sealant had glued the tyres. Etc etc.
Must be 18 months since i swung a leg over her. The problem with chasing fire-starters round the moorlands every non-working waking hour of the week is one forgets to take time for oneself.
Geraldine (named after the song by Glasvegas) was my gift to me after i left the Army.
I ought to get her sent to those-that-built her at Keep Pedalling in Manchester for a service and get back out on her.
I was chatting about some train-to-somewhere-and-ride-back day trips with a mate when i remembered a few other things …..
I own a Brompton which has been being used by a friend for 18months. How does one forget about their Brompton.
It’s called Seth.
and i also remembered about the greatest cycle touring film ever made …… Mechanised Tramp
Is it true that dangling your cup under your saddle as a declaration of no intention to pedal quickly whatsoever, is now not the donw thing 🤷♂️
Times have changed
I guess that i ought to end with a warning about the likely imminence of a MAMIL with milk white legs huffing and puffing along country lanes hereabouts in the near future ….
Those were the days!!
P.S. i just remembered i even used to write about cycling n’ all!!
If you’ve got an animal that needs rescuing …. if no one else can help …. and if you can find them …. maybe you should call …
It wasn’t a cat called Ramsley this time …. it was a calf called Frank.
Frank was a twin born yesterday afternoon in woodland at the bottom of one of the valleys on the Eastern Moors. Unfortunately for Frank his mum had made it quite clear that she didn’t love him as much as his sibling. Cue the crack team of @eastern_moors_partnership rescuers rolled out from Barbrook Cottage to give Nick and Hannah @north_lees_hall_farm a hand getting Frank to the safety of the farm.
In the first few hours of his life Frank was bundled in to an old Army rucksack and carried across the stream to a waiting ‘Uber’ ArgoCat from where he was transported cross country to the farm Land Rover and then to the farm.
The last photo is Frank enjoying his breakfast the following morning.
*Surely we should have our own Netflix show by now ….
