by Harry Beaves
‘How would you describe the difference between a teacher, a leader, a coach and a trainer?’
I blinked in disbelief. She was now feeding my prejudices of the civilian mountain training profession. This was just the sort of semantic garbage I imagined teacher-trainers discussed as they sat cross-legged on the floor joyfully devouring yoghurt. ‘Oh, no meat for me, thank you. I’m with the teacher-trainers.’
I gave the question careful consideration, sandwich poised in mid-air, and in that moment one of Snowdon’s many seagulls swooped down and stole it clean from my hand and flew off, thus depriving me of my cheering carbohydrate boost.
I was wrong, things could get worse and it was all downhill from there on, downhill to Lliwedd and the Miners’ Track and downhill with my spirits. That evening the Warden of Plas-Y-Brenin called me into his office. Strangely there was no mention of my attitude to the hills, but he told me that my navigation had not been up to standard and I would be rigorously scrutinised on navigation day. This was just the confidence boost I needed that evening as I went in to sit a long, written paper on mountain weather.
There were four in our group for the navigation day and I was given the first leg – pressure on again right from the start. The assessor was Stevie Mitchell from Glenmore Lodge who had been the instructor for the snow-hole exercise in Chapter 22, but, although we knew each other quite well, there was absolutely no chance of favours. I was feeling good and dug my heel in with confidence when we reached the first objective. I was similarly confident with the two legs that I had to navigate later on and, unlike the previous day, things went well.
I passed the navigation assessment and was relieved to learn that my overall performance was good enough to be awarded the MIC, even if my meat-polluted military brain never appreciated the difference between a teacher, a leader, a coach and a trainer. The MIC is a valuable and highly respected qualification which few servicemen held and, in years to come, it was to stand me in good stead when applying for jobs in the service mountain-training world.
In my fortnight’s leave between postings I took a train out to Chamonix where I met Peter Page, a Royal Engineers officer who had been on the staff at Tywyn with me. Pete had travelled out in his camper van with his wife, Babs, and Gary, his two-year-old son. The first route we planned to do was the Mer de Glace face of the Grépon. The Grépon is a very striking rock pinnacle known in French as an ‘aiguille’ and sits on a spur overlooking the beautiful glacier known as the Mer de Glace. It is a classic route about 850m long with a guide book time of eight hours and promised spectacular views of the Mont Blanc massif.
The weather forecast was good and at about 2pm we set off on the Montenvers cog railway to the station above the Mer de Glace. From there we followed a winding footpath that rose up the side wall of the glacier to the Bivouac de la Tour-Rouge. The Alps are dotted with a network of bivouacs, or mountain huts, that provide shelter for climbers as they travel through the area. These huts vary in sophistication from comfortable mountain hotels to garden sheds, perched on precipices. The Tour Rouge came in the latter category. Today’s guide book describes it as a ruin and unusable and at that time wooden boards were missing, but it provided a dry shelter from which we could begin our route the following day. Most importantly, it cost nothing.
We set off at dawn and crunched our way across the snow to the start of the rock. Chamonix granite is warm, rough and friendly and the early stages of our route were quite straightforward. At one point the guide book told us to abseil down into a gully and climb the wall on the other side. We did so without realising that we would not be able to climb back up the rock that we had abseiled down, so effectively, from that point on we had no retreat. It was a superb day and the views and the position were as spectacular as promised, but we were finding the route difficult and going very slowly. As the day went on the aiguille seemed to be getting no closer and we began to worry that we would be beaten by darkness. This gradually became inevitable and at about 8pm we decided we would have to spend the night out so we found a flattish ledge, cleared the biggest boulders and prepared to settle down. Provided the weather held, we had sufficient clothes to survive but we had only brought food for three meals. The third meal had been lunch, but we still had a couple of tea bags and half a dozen biscuits left over, so we made do with that. I settled down with my spare socks on my feet inside my rucksack and a down duvet jacket with the hood pulled over my face. The stars came out and twinkled in a black night sky while the lights of Chamonix shone safely in the valley as we spent a bitterly cold night sleeping fitfully on the ledge. It was a very strange situation: serious to the point of life-threatening, but we had the knowledge and equipment, coupled with the strength and the confidence to get through. It was an adventure and there was no doubt that we would find a way out, though today I find it amusing that neither of us considered it enough of an emergency to open our survival rations!
Unable to sleep we started moving at dawn, shaking the stiffness out of our tired limbs. We made a third and fourth cup of tea from the same tea bags and shared an orange that I found somewhere in my bag. I remember my hands trembling uncontrollably with the cold as we roped up for the start, but as the sun rose there was the most amazing transformation. The rock warmed and the energy began to come back into our bodies. We reached the summit of the aiguille mid-morning, but the joy was short-lived as the route down took us on to the Nantillons Glacier which we could see stretching away below us. The Nantillons Glacier is nicknamed the ‘Englishmen’s Graveyard’ as its reputation was so notorious during the early days of Alpine exploration. The surface is an endless series of yawning crevasses which became a long boring zigzag route that demanded careful concentration at a time when we were very tired and, not surprisingly, very hungry.
It was mid-afternoon when we finally plodded in to the campsite where Babs, a lovely Devon girl, was playing with Gary on the grass. She looked up and smiled. ‘Have you had a good time, you two? Would you like a cup of tea?’
Babs, if only you knew! We had had an absolutely brilliant time.
Pete and I did a number of enjoyable climbs in the area, then drove through the Mont Blanc tunnel and climbed on the Italian side of the Mont Blanc massif from a campsite in Val Veni.
Our last climb of the holiday was to be a relatively short route called Le Trident. Pete decided to take Babs and Gary with us on the cable car to stay overnight at the Torino Hut, a large mountain hotel from which the route started. The weather was superb and Le Trident had provided a fitting finale as we sat on the terrace of the Torino Hut enjoying a coffee at the end of the afternoon. The waiter asked us which room we were in. We told him we weren’t staying and that we were going down on the last cable car at 5pm.
‘But that’s the 5pm cable car,’ he said, pointing to the one that had just departed.
‘No, that’s the 4pm.’
‘It’s the 5pm.’ said the waiter. ‘What time do you have?’
‘4pm.’
‘No, it’s 4pm in France. In Italy it is 5.’
We had forgotten to change our watches when we came through the Mont Blanc tunnel and watched in horror as the last cable car glided gently down the mountain. It was vital that we got down that night or Pete and I would not make work on Monday morning, which for me was the start of the Commando course. There was no way out, we would have to walk down. The map showed a rough path, but, because of the cable car, rarely was anyone foolish enough to use it so it was very overgrown. Pete carried Gary on his shoulders and I took his rucksack as well as my own. As darkness fell, it became an absolute nightmare of scrub and boulders and it was five hours before, exhausted, we fell into our sleeping bags by the roadside. I often tell the tale as an example of what a good holiday should be. If we could spend a week with our watches an hour different from the actual time then we were obviously concentrating on the holiday and the things that really mattered.
I had enjoyed my time at Tywyn immensely. Northern Ireland was
behind me and I rarely talked of what went on, but in hindsight there were signs of the submarine. I would describe myself then as a very good climber. What stopped me from being an excellent climber was a reluctance to push my luck. As a climber ascends a rock face he clips his rope into devices called runners, which he attaches to the rock to minimise the distance he might fall if he came off. I was always acutely aware of the danger and was very reluctant to risk climbing very far beyond my last runner.
Edward Whymper, who climbed the Matterhorn in 1865, famously ended his memoirs Scrambles Amongst the Alps with the words:
Climb if you will, but remember that courage and strength are naught without prudence…
I would have said that my caution was in line with Whymper’s guidance, but, more likely, it was an over-cautious attitude born of my Northern Ireland experience. It was the sonar warning pinging off the submarine in my mind, prompting me to be vigilant and beware for my own safety.
Chapter 24
Getting Qualified
My time at Alpine altitude with Pete Page was great fun and had strengthened my heart and lungs, but I might have been better advised running with loads in preparation for what came next. Before Commando selection, Gunners spent three weeks of preparatory training, known as the ‘beat up’, with 29 Commando Regiment RA, based at the Royal Citadel on Plymouth Hoe. This period was very hard physically and was invaluable as, not only did it sharpen our fitness and weed out the no-hopers, but it also gave us insight into the mindless, trivial and demeaning treatment that we would constantly endure on the course run by the Royal Marines. By the time we reported for the actual Commando course we were confident that we could pass all of the physical tests required and had a fair knowledge of the sort of mucking about that we might experience.
The All Arms Commando Course is held at the Commando Training Centre (CTC), Lympstone in a picturesque setting overlooking the River Exe. The course has been described as ‘an advanced infantry course, run in a very physical manner culminating in a series of demanding physical tests that must be passed before the award of the coveted Green Beret’. Unfortunately the staff ran the course in the style of recruit training. No credit was given for previous knowledge or experience, and officers and men with ten years’ service were taught military basics right down to stripping and assembling a weapon.
We had been warned that at some time on the first day we would face the much talked about ‘mud run’. The assault course at CTC is on the bottom field, bordering the River Exe. The river is tidal at this point and when the tide goes out a huge expanse of mud flats is exposed. At about 1500 on the first day we were on the assault course, doing badly (as expected) and were all being screamed at for being totally pathetic. We were lined up and told to unpack our web equipment for the regulation contents to be inspected. Instructions said that our one litre plastic water bottles must at all times be full. Taken literally this is impossible, as, if a water bottle is filled to the brim, when you screw the cap on the air will displace some of the water inside so that when the bottle is re-opened the water will probably be half an inch from the brim.
So it was on the day. Our water bottles were considered to be ‘not full’. We were the most despicable forms of lowlife. If we were so stupid that we could not be trusted to obey simple instructions then we had to be taught a lesson and we knew what that was… In three ranks we doubled (ran) down the field towards the mud flats. We ran on, mud splashing up our legs, we turned left, turned right, again and again and were ordered to run on the spot. But we were just beginning, star jumps, bunny hops, sit-ups, press-ups, ‘Come on you bunch of maggots. Get your spotty faces right down in it,’ and finally ‘leopard crawl’ on our bellies through six inches of cloying river mud.
At some time during all this one of the young lads began singing. ‘When you’re smiling, when you’re smiling, the whole world smiles with you…’ And, of course, we all joined in, much to the annoyance of the training staff who ranted and raved even more. Instead of flinching, the students began hurling themselves into the mud enthusiastically. We couldn’t get dirtier so things just couldn’t get any worse. We had stolen the initiative and shown the staff that their idea of punishment didn’t actually bother us and the more they yelled and hollered, the more stupid they looked. Perhaps the staff went back to the office and said. ‘That course showed a lot of character today singing like that to show they could take it.’ But I doubt if any of them were able to think that way.
Water and weapons don’t normally mix but back in the accommodation we were still laughing as we stripped our rifles and ran them under the warm tap in the bath to get all the mud off, before oiling them thoroughly and hoping that no rust spots would appear before the inspection the following morning.
I didn’t find the course particularly demanding as there were rarely more than two hours of physical activity in a day. The remainder was padded out with weapon training and fieldcraft that we already knew so the biggest worry was injury. Almost as a gesture, I began playing rugby for Devonport Services on Saturdays and had a number of enjoyable games. I finally had to admit this was too much when I fell asleep at the wheel driving to a match at Totness after an overnight exercise on Dartmoor!
One of the good things about the Commando course was the strong emphasis on teamwork in everything we did. On battle runs the weakest ran at the front of the squad and were helped and supported by the strongest, who occasionally even carried their weapon or webbing. This, of course, is the way it should be, but the drawback was that several of those who needed help were officers. We all had bad days when we found things hard, but an officer being helped along by the men, in my mind, was showing little leadership and didn’t deserve much respect; even less did he deserve to wear a Green Beret. Even on the final tests some were dragged through by others. In my simple mind I felt if you couldn’t pass the tests through your own efforts, then you hadn’t earned your Green Beret. However if I was disappointed by the Commando course, living and working with the Royal Marines afterwards fully lived up to expectation in terms of fun and professionalism.
* * *
By contrast ‘P’ Company, the physical selection course that had to be passed before attending parachute training, treated us for what we were, trained soldiers volunteering to serve with an elite. The aim was to prepare us to pass the tests that the Airborne Forces demanded to prove our worthiness to serve with them. There were no frills or padding, just a heavy period of physical activity in the morning and a second in the afternoon, interspersed with relatively unimportant films or lectures during which we fought to stay awake.
‘P’ Company had no time for losers and you never took a backward step. Officers and Senior NCOs were expected to set the example. They always ran at the back of the squad, the most difficult place, and were expected to help and encourage the weaker members if they flagged, but when a man dropped back and lost contact with the squad, that was it. He was bundled into the follow-up Land Rover and his course was probably over.
Normal military activities were always given a special ‘P’ Company twist. Even though I was never a strong swimmer I could just about pass the Army Swimming Test so ‘swimming’ on the programme looked to be a welcome break from constantly running in boots and denims, but oh no, not the ‘P’ Company way. The first thing was a dive, not a jump, off the three-metre board. As I and many other tried to conceal our apprehension a couple of smug looking individuals piped up.
‘Staff, we’re non-swimmers.’
‘That’s OK, lads. Someone will fish you out.’ So the non-swimmers sort of fell off the three-metre board, came up spluttering and were fished out by the life-saver, to the cheers and admiration of the rest of us.
So it continued, with each activity becoming more outrageous until the grand finale. Aldershot Military Swimming Pool had a second diving platform at the shallow end and, what we hadn’t noticed, a trapeze bar suspended from the roof above the middle of the pool.
First ex
ercise: you are handed the bar standing on the platform at the shallow end and you swing across on the trapeze to the platform at the deep end. Some achieved it. OK so far.
Second exercise: the bar is swung to you as you stand on the platform at the shallow end. You jump and catch the moving bar and swing over to the other platform. Most people crash in and apprehension starts to mount.
Third exercise: you catch the bar and as you swing over you release the bar at the mid-point and enter the water in an elegant Tom Daley tariff 9.5 dive. This was impossible for anyone to get right and we all cheered and roared at the crashing, stinging entries that we made. Constipation was never a problem on ‘P’ Company.
Conventional activities in the gym were also given the ‘P’ Company twist. with all the usual vaults at school, but ‘P’ Company’s vaulting was conducted like a parachuting exercise. In the aircraft the first man stands in the door with the remainder up tight behind him. The red light comes on as the warning, then the green light and the dispatcher screams ‘GO… GO… GO…’ and taps each man on the shoulder in quick succession as the signal to jump.
The vaulting box was set up at the end of the gym on all five sections with a beat board (a small springboard that today has been replaced by the trampette) for take-off. Two PTIs stood-in at the box for safety and another stood at the other end of the gym at the start. The starter acted like the dispatcher, screaming. ‘GO… GO… GO…’ to set us on our way. The aim was to have two people running up as the first person was clearing the box. We would keep going, vaulting time and again, getting ever more tired and breathless until we were told to stop or, more likely, there was a hilarious pile up (‘P’ Company humour).
Panting like an old man, I misjudged the take-off, clipped the box and brought the top section down on top of me as I lay on my back on the safety mat. Seemingly oblivious, the dispatcher kept up his ‘GO… GO… GO…’ and numbers two, three, four, five and others behind them soared over the box into what became the gym version of a motorway pile up.