Our Responsibility
Posted by Darren - updated 11/02/09
Without getting political about access rights to land, erosion of popular routes or charities using the three peaks far too much.
As I have stated before we are highly sensitive to the environmental impact our challenge could make, we are doing everything possible to reduce our event logistics and resources.
There are many responsible walkers and hikers that visit all the peaks we hope to climb every year.
Both Bryn and I agree that the 3-Peaks Challenge is not a route we wanted our event to follow. Yes we have to travel to the mountains and peaks, but we’ll be camping, enjoying the surroundings, pacing ourselves so we can take as many pictures, videos and enjoy the locations we’ll be in. We intend to make sure local park authorities advice and guidance is sought before our event takes place to be sure we adhere to any changes in mountain access restrictions.
We'll have all the equipment and training to make sure we are responsible, worthy and respectful of all our actions.
The rules are pretty random if you wonder around the internet with regards to individual 3-Peaks events, the routes are usually either 24 hours or three days and participation numbers vary greatly from well organised events to individual un-sponsored groups.
| Break down of our event vs 3-Peaks. | |
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UK Everest Challenge
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General 3-Peaks
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| Team - only two persons will be on the each hill at any one time. | Normal 3-Peaks challenges can have 10 or 20 people in a group covering a hill. |
| Night ascents - we will NOT be covering the peaks at night, we might have joked about it, but will certainly not be climbing any hills at night. Our schedule is compact but achievable without endangering routes and ourselves in the dark. | As it stands with the 24 hour event Scafell Pike is walked during the night, with quite a disruption to locals who have to put up with slamming doors, vehicles arriving and departing annually. In the summer months hundreds of people arrive on weekend evenings. Excited climbers tend not to be quite hikers. |
| Experience - both Bryn and myself know and understand countryside codes and laws where required. Visiting many of the country parks many times over the years. | Whilst I certainly have no right to generalise people's skill levels, many people I have passed on these walks are on there first visits to hills. |
| Travelling - we have several contingency plans that will allow for problems with delays. Instead of charging through country lanes late at night to get to a campsite, we'll be either taking detours or camping else where and just walk further. | Sometimes the time constraints of the event organisers could mean, once you've started you have to finish, night or day. Immaterial if eighty people arrive in ten minibuses in the same car park. |
Any rubbish that came with us...comes back with us! We also have our own toilet facility in the vehicle [ok, sounds glamorous it's just a camping porta-loo] if we need it ;-)
In the coming months we'll be training all over the UK, taking part in cross country events, half marathons and marathons - because we truly love the outdoors. We are also considering cancelling the Guinness Record challenge just incase it is gives out mixed signals.
Some people have asked us "what are we doing for the local economy, why should we support you?". Two main reason, we have and will continue visiting, shopping, eating in local resturants and enjoying all the national parks, hopefully for many years to come. Secondly the charities we have picked work with people all over the UK, to improve their lives or aid their suffering.
The best bit about our event is to ENJOYING it! We'll be filming via web cams, outdoor blogging in the evenings and taking pictures all over the UK. Who wants to climb at night, you can't see the views!
++++2010 update++++
As we make plans for next years event. We have yet to decide if we will continue in the same format, all we know it'll be longer and more difficult. High on our list is reducing our carbon impact by 50% for the 2010 event. We hope to achieve this by; in-house printing with complete recycled products, further reducing our vehicles impact and even thinking of cycling between hills and cut out the vehicle moments where possible.
