BB2046 : Those Were The Years That Were

Wednesday 30th December 2020

The thought came to mind as I started to compose this report.  It wasn’t just that this was our last outing of 2020- a very bizarre year.  What had struck me was the huge number of buildings seen today that carried a reference to a year.

It started where we parked at the Junction House in Burneside.  This looks as if it might once have been a toll bar house.  It shows the date 1835.  Tony had parked opposite the Church.  The Vicarage, a fine Victorian house as suited to Victorian ministers, boasted 1856.

There followed a stream of dates, all relating to the specialist paper manufacturing company, James Cropper plc, established 1845.

I had never previously realised that Burneside is in many ways a model village. Not so obviously laid out as, say, Lever Brothers’ Port Sunlight or Welwyn Garden City but many of the houses were clearly associated with Croppers and several of these had dates on them.

First we passed an unusual small building that boasts three dates on separate plaques: 1717, 1885 and 1855.  This is near the entrance to the factory so presumably has some relevance to the mill but I don’t know what.  

As we walked by the factory and its cottages, several more years jumped out at us: 1990 above a huge factory door, 1872 on a drinking fountain and 1892 on the Roger Row cottages.

After leaving the industrial units behind, we headed out of the Burneside on this cold and frosty morning.  We were on our way to Gurnal Dubbs, our target for the day.  

We were the Burneboyos, Philip, Stan, Tony  and me, on our way to meet Stephen, the Potterman, waiting for us up on the Potter Fell Road.  Meanwhile the Stafellows, Martin and Mike, were setting off from Staveley heading for the same destination.  Yes, I know that totals seven and the maximum permitted number was six but that is why we were arriving in two groups and ne’er the twain shall meet; well, not so close as you would call it a meeting.

By ‘eck, it were cold to begin with but once we had met up with Stephen, the day started to warm up.  By the time we reached Gurnal Dubbs, it was a quite magnificent day for mid-winter.  

There was snow on the distant fells and the air was clear.  One hardy lad was swimming in the Dubbs.  Of course, the boathouse, a Cropper property, carried a date: the year 1986.

We Burneboyos and the Potterman lunched, bang on noon, to Tony's delight, atop of a rocky mound.

The Stafellows remained below, suitably not grouped with us albeit within shouting distance.

The separation was maintained for the return. The  Potterman went back the way he came, Stafellows dropped down from Potter Tarn.....

..... to the River Kent via the Ghyll Pool whilst we Burneboyos took the Side House route off the fell.  We didn’t even encounter each other by the river as, although our routes overlapped, we were on opposite banks.  Civilisation was reached at Cowan Head.

Back in Burneside, more years appeared; 1898 over a door; 1897 at the Bryce Institute.  Then a much more modern slate carved 1989 with intriguing initials.  It looked as if it were waiting for a suitable building on which to be mounted.

A cluster of buildings set back from the road had plaques on the wall.  One inscribed EDITH CROPPER 1853 – 1923 and the other CHARLES CROPPER 1852 – 1924.  I turned round and saw that in an enclosure was an astrolabe with more inscription but no date.  As I approached I failed to notice the ice on the floor and slipped.  If you will excuse the pun, about which the family must be heartily sick, I nearly came a cropper.            

God gave sunny hours to the home of Charles and Edith Cropper
May his light shine on these sixteen homes built in memory of them.

I saw no more dates other than at the Junction House that was still boasting the year 1835.  

So ended BOOTboys year 2020, a very strange one in which our activities, like so much else, have been radically affected by the pandemic.   As Millicent would have sung “That was the Year that was, it’s over, let it go.”  Gladly.  Let’s hope that 2021 proves to be memorable for much more positive reasons.

Don, Wednesday 30th December 2020

Statto's Lament

What a strange year.  We set off with high hopes.  In particular, Stan and I would finish off our current round of the Wainwrights and others with similar aspirations would make big inroads into their outstanding totals.  In the end, only Mike T made such inroads and much of that was with his other walking group.

On the other hand, the stats are not as bad as I feared.  Obviously the coronavirus lockdown had a severe adverse effect on our ambitions but not on the number of events.  The final outing BB2046 would suggest that there were 46 but BB2010, the aptly titled “We’ll meet again”, was a lament anticipating a lack of imminent activity:

When shall we BOOTboys meet again?
In thunder, lightning or in rain?
When Coronavirus has gone
When the Covid battle’s won
That’s when we'll be in the sun.

Well, the battle is far from won but it only took four weeks before our collective ingenuity found ways to carry on BOOTboying whilst remaining totally compliant with the rules of the day.  

The multiple concurrent events, be they relays, scatters, or contemporaneous, with or without specific common features, enabled us to post the joint highest reference number since records began.  Our Comitibus stats are also impressive with a total of 23 plus another 12, mostly wives, who joined in for the more disparate activities.  Consequently, even without taking into account the “extras”, the average participant number was a record 5.2 giving rise to a record-smashing total of 267 boy-days.

Mileage wasn’t too bad given the circumstances.  It wasn’t practical to compile stats for every event but 38 did qualify and the average mileage was 8.6- not the lowest on record.  Even height climbed was not on the bottom rung- its 1,484 topping that of 2011, albeit well below the long term average .

The long term total of BB miles has now topped 25,000 and the total feet climbed is almost 200 times the height of Everest.  Not a bad achievement for a group of old men.

It is too soon to predict the outcome for 2021.  At the time of writing, the number of new Covid cases is getting worse, a new variant has arrived and level 4 lockdown implemented.  On the other hand several vaccines are imminently expected.  Hopefully they will soon inject new energy into our activities and Statto’s report for next year will not be a lament but a celebration.

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STATISTICS

BB2046

Date:

Wednesday 30th December 2020

Features:

Gurnal Dubbs, Burneside

Comitibus:

Burneboyos: Don, Philip, Stan, Tony

Stafellows:  Martin, Mike B

Potterman: Stephen

Distance in miles (Garmin):

9.7 / 6.8 / 4.6

Height climbed in feet (OMN):

1,106 /1,076 / 525

GPX track

BB2046

Terry

Martin

Don

Mike B

Stephen

Tony

Stan

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