Annual Dinner (Wales)

Pictures from the walk via Cwm Bychan and back up the Afon Glaslyn to Beddgelert, on the Annual Dinner weekend.

Annual Dinner (Wales)

Commemorative Tree Planting at Ty Powdwr.

The Sunday following the Annual Dinner saw a sizeable bunch of KMC members generously give up some of their time to help with the tree planting project at Ty Powdwr. This is intended to commemorate all of those members of the Club who have died during the 66 years of the Club's existence.

A mixture of damson and rowan trees was set out in four clusters towards the northern edge of our paddock (i.e. the Deiniolen side), with each group provided with a protective surround which in the course of time can be removed once the trees have hopefully become established. These particular tree species and the location were chosen, after consultation, as the most likely to succeed. As the originator of the idea for this planting I would like to thank the 2010 Committee for supporting the project, and all of those members who helped literally with the spadework - a good example of the collective spirit in the Club. A special thank-you is also due to Katie Horgan for her extra effort in co-ordinating the whole project, consulting for advice and for supervising the provision of the trees themselves plus other materials.

Whenever you go to Ty Powdwr now, I hope you will, like me, go to cast an eye over these trees as they grow, and pause to reflect on those fellow members and friends whom they commemorate. Not in undue sadness, but rather in remembering the comradeship, the shared experiences in the mountains and the fun enjoyed in their company.

I will recall, among other incidents, the winter day Alan Payne scared us by stepping off the narrowest part of the Aonach Eagach; Dorothy Wright's ready smile in all circumstances; Gerald Carradus having to go all the way back down from the crag to the Cromlech Boulders to retrieve his sack which bounced and rolled down the hill only seconds after he'd just toiled up there; Bowden Black showboating his way up Harding's Superdirect Finish with no runners; and the many times spent having a smoke-choked natter with Len Stubbs at Kettleshulme. And I will smile.

You will each have your own recollections and this will be good place to bring them to mind. The trees are a token of our affections for all those former members who have enriched our KMC lives.

Jim Gregson.