Announcing the Anniversary Bagging Challenge...

Following on from the successful Wainwrights challenge during the 25th anniversary year, our challenge for this year is…. The UK’s Historic County Tops (as defined in the Cicerone guidebook). It’s a very simple concept: between 1st October 2018 and 30th September 2019, we need someone to climb every one of the historic county tops and bag it in the name of CUHWC. Obviously, we’ll need a “summit selfie” as proof – the more entertaining the better. All the way from Brown Willy in Cornwall to Ronas Hill in Shetland, you’re never too far from a hill which needs climbing!

Club hero Ben Brunt has developed a Google Map to track our progress - you can see it here.

You can submit your bags on the form here. Pick your newest conquest from the list, and it'll be marked off on the map. You're very much encouraged to take a "summit selfie" which will immortalise your hillwalking exploits on the bagging map (see the photo linking guide below). Eyeing up an ascent but fancy some company? Why not post to the Discuss list or Facebook group and see if you pull a group together - particularly for the popular ones!

An attempt on Cambridgeshire’s summit top is planned for Sunday 21st October, so keep that day free if you want to come along – ice axes, harnesses and supplementary oxygen not required...

Happy bagging!

P.S. – David H promises a bottle of “good” whisky to whoever bags the Northern Isles duo…

With two months to go of the bagging challenge, 11 tops remain unbagged. These range from the might Carn Eige and Ben Macdui to the "curiously flat" Arbury Hill. I've set up a Google document to coordinate our efforts:

Bagging coordination doc

Please take a look and plan your bagging trips!

Linking photos to your bagging report

Because of the awkwardness of Google FusionTables, links you submit must go directly to the image (jpeg), not to a Google Photos album or similar. If you run into difficulties, submit any working link to the album and I'll sort out the direct image linking when I get round to it.

Bagging map forever

The bagging challenge is complete with a week of the anniversary year to go! Congratulations to all who took part!

Sadly, FusionTables is being decommissioned, and so the interactive bagging map will soon be no more. The record of bags and summit photos will be preserved on this Google map.

30th Anniversary Stash: it's finally here! We have three stash options on offer: a trendy buff, a cotton t-shirt with the brand new 30th Anniversary design - which pays homage to the mountains of Cambridgeshire - or a technical t-shirt with the new CUHWC logo on the back.

The buffs are available at £11 each, the cotton t-shirts at £12 each and the technical t-shirts at £22. Stash will be distributed at the 30th Anniversary weekend, or there is the possibility of dropping stash off in Cambridge or posting it out to anyone who isn't going to Langdale but wants some.

Orders MUST be placed and paid for before the end of 18th January otherwise we can't guarantee they'll be ready. Any questions? Contact cuhwc30(at)gmail(dot)com.

Order your stash here!

Thirtieth Anniversary Weekend

The Thirtieth Anniversary Committee is pleased to invite CUHWC members, past and present, to celebrate 30 years of our club! Over the weekend of 15-17th February 2019, YHA Langdale will exclusively host over 100 CUHWC members and Duffers in a huge celebration. As well as two days of walking in the beautiful Langdale area of the Lake District, the evening of Saturday 16th will see a black-tie, all-inclusive, hillwalking-themed party on a scale not seen since… well, since the 25th anniversary!

Tickets are now on sale, with generously subsidised options available for current students. Student and adult tickets include a three-course meal designed and cooked specially for us by Bespoke Catering Cumbria, two nights’ accommodation at the spectacular YHA Langdale – a Victorian mansion - or Elterwater YH, and a souvenir issue of the 30th Anniversary Journal. The drinking tickets will come with an impressive, possibly even excessive, quantity of wines, spirits and local beers.

Because we think we are likely to exceed the bed capacity of YHA Langdale, we have also booked the nearby Elterwater hostel. To make sure we don’t spend a fortune on only hosting a few guests there, we have decided to operate a waiting list once Langdale is full: we will only confirm our booking with Elterwater once we have enough guests on the waiting list to make it viable. Book early to be sure of your place!

Update 1st November 2018: Langdale is currently full, with insufficient bookings to make Elterwater viable. We're still taking bookings, and will update you on the situation after the 10th November. This deadline is to make sure, if we need to, that we can cancel our Elterwater reservation without being charged...

We have reserved a number of spaces for people new to CUHWC. We'll allocate these places just after the end of term (ie early December) so freshers, please continue to sign-up, and indicate on the form that you're new!

To be sure of the celebration being affordable to loan-funded students, travel from Cambridge is included, as normal, in the trip price. We kindly ask for a contribution of £25 for others who wish to travel from Cambridge, including those in receipt of a PhD stipend. We will organise a car-sharing system in due course for others.

Finally, we plan to close ticket sales on 10th November. We look forwards to seeing as many of you as possible in February!

• Infant: £35
• Junior: £50
• Student (non-drinking): £80
• Student: £90
• Adult (non-drinking): £110
• Adult: £120

Book here via our webform!

(Because we are limited by total occupants rather than by beds, we have to charge for infants even if they are in a cot. The junior rate includes a child-friendly meal from the caterers, but no alcohol)

Additionally, for those who would find it easier, there is a possibility of paying by installments – please email cuhwc30@gmail.com for more information.

Bagging Challenge

County Tops coming soon!