© 2023 Richard Taylor
Something happened to me before my marriage, before I even met my wife, that my mind keeps returning to these days. It bothers me in many ways. And I guess that means I really should have talked about it to someone before now.
I had an office job in the early nineties. It was a large impersonal office where people trudged in at the same time every day, did the same things every day, and went home again. Apparently, once or twice a year someone would organise a social event. People would usually go and say they enjoyed it. And they always said "we should do this more often" but didn't. It was a miserable place.
Then, after I had been there about 6 months, a new manager arrived with big ideas. He had been very successful in other offices and he'd been brought in to make us better. Oh no, I thought, he's going to make us do team building. And I was right.
To be fair, some of it was fun and some of it was useful. This guy, Mr Morrison, could hardly make the office morale worse, so there was a lot of low hanging fruit for him to leverage in all sorts of proactively collaborative ways. But the budget was limited so instead of doing big-ticket organised events we ended up doing mostly home-made challenges.
One was a trek. The idea was to find our way, in teams of two, from Patterdale in the Lake District to Kirkby Stephen in the Yorkshire Dales. It's part of the Coast to Coast route so it shouldn't have been too hard. Except that the route is unsigned, this section is about 30 miles long, quite rough terrain and most of my colleagues were pretty unfit. Why he chose that route, God knows.
We had tents and maps supplied by Mr Morrison. After the long drive up from London on the Friday night, a few drinks and a bad night's sleep, we weren't exactly raring to go on Saturday morning. Then we got the first surprise. We had all assumed that we could pair up as we liked. But no. Mr Morrison had allocated the teams according to his own demonic plan. Instead of walking with the vaguely tolerable Mark, I was teamed up with Sarah the Sales Director.
She was ten years my senior, in her early 30s, with two small children and a reputation for being something of a hard taskmaster. That was almost all I knew about her, as sales was really not my thing. Nor did I really care to find out much more, as salespeople were not my thing either.
Anyway, paired we were and set off on our trek at 10 minute intervals. Of the 6 groups we were off first and for the first couple of miles set a brisk pace to avoid being caught by the later groups. Also, for July, it wasn't a particularly warm day and we were departing at about 8am. Several people had remarked at the start that they wished they'd brought some warmer gear.
After the awkward "nice to meet you properly" and "how long have you lived in London" conversations had passed, Sarah hit on a topic that we both seemed to have an interest in. Movies. Not that we had the same taste, but at least we could see each other's point of view and knew about the different films and actors that we were referencing.
Being very much the junior partner in the pair, and not wanting to damage my position in the company, I let Sarah steer the conversation as she liked without completely conceding that all her favourites were indeed total masterpieces. Persuasive as she was, I did agree that I would give "The Princess Bride" a second chance as soon as we returned to civilisation.
So the trek seemed to be going well. Sarah was nothing like the "bitch" that I had heard she was and we seemed to be getting on OK. But the weather was not getting any warmer. If anything it was getting colder. And mistier.
And I was a bit worried about the tents we had been given by Mr Morrison. I would have preferred to bring my own tent, or at least had a chance to put this one up and test it before we came out. But this was part of the challenge. We had to work it out for ourselves.
I could accept a challenge, or two. But, if I'd known at the start that Mr Morrison was in fact a clueless idiot, then I would have stayed at home and saved myself a lot of trouble.
Because, as the weather drew in and we realised that our maps were not very good, being merely monochrome photocopies of an old hiking book, none of us knew that Mr Morrison had failed to check the local weather forecast or inform anyone else where we were going. And being the early 90s none of us had mobile phones. So if we got lost, or in trouble, then no-one would be coming to look for us.
As the mist thickened and the temperature continued to drop, for once I was grateful to my parents for taking me camping in the Lake District every August as a kid. And when I say every August, I mean every August, whatever the weather. So I'd seen really bad conditions in the Lakes before.
What I had never done was go out walking in terrible weather because, unlike Mr Morrison, my dad always checked the local forecast. And so the lesson I hadn't learned yet was that the people in charge don't always know what they need to do. After that trip I never again assumed that my safety was fine in the hands of someone else.
Luckily I had inherited some of my dad's "be prepared" philosophy and had brought a proper Ordnance Survey map, one of my dad's in fact, and a compass. I also had some extra clothing, some of which I had already given to Sarah since she was shivering despite already putting on all the layers she had with her.
In the mist my map wasn't much use, since we couldn't see any landmarks at all. But it did at least reassure me that going east would get us to where we wanted to be. And that there were no nearer places that we could divert to. We had no choice but to spend the night out here.
Sarah seemed visibly happier once she realised I had the map and compass. For a while she was very quiet, but once I showed her where we probably were and how we could be sure we were heading for Kirkby Stephen, even in the mist, she perked up again. We got back to chatting freely as we carefully proceeded eastward.
By about 3pm we were both tired, mentally and physically. The ground was rocky in places so it took some effort to get your footing right at times. A twisted ankle would have been a nightmare.
Soon afterwards we came across a nice sheltered spot between some large rocks and stopped for a snack. Sarah looked at me but didn't say anything. "Do you want to camp here?" I suggested. "Yes. I so need to rest." was her grateful response. The wind was getting up a bit now, which would clear the mist, but it might also bring a storm so this was as good a site as any to see it out.
As I had feared the tents were a bit rubbish. They were either a large 1-man or a small 2-man, it was hard to tell. All I knew was that they wouldn't last long in a storm. Sarah could see my disquiet. Looking through the collection of poles, ropes and flimsy canvas I pondered a few possibilities.
"I think we can make one reasonable tent out of this stuff. If we put one inside the other and double up the poles, ropes and pegs. It might survive if the weather gets worse." I said.
"OK, let's do it." was Sarah's response.
I remember smiling. At that point in my life, people didn't usually listen to much I said, let alone agree with me so easily.
The hybrid tent was helped by a few other items that I had popped into my rucksack just in case. Some string to bind the poles together, a sturdy mallet and a pack of large tent pegs that my dad always swore by. More than once I remember us waking after a storm and finding many of the other tents on the campsite had blown away. My dad's tent always stayed put!
Of course, the tent was very cramped. But with the wind strengthening and a light rain starting, it was a relief to finally be out of the elements. Squashed in together between our kit, Sarah and I even managed to joke about the situation a bit as we ate whatever we could, cold, from our supplies.
A few hours later it was already quite dark. The wind was strong now. And rain was lashing down on our poor little tent. The conversation was quite sombre. We were both worried about the other teams. Wondering where they were and if they were OK. At least no water was leaking in yet. Both of us tried to change the subject to more jolly topics, but it was hard to not drift back into speculation.
At one point we had a crazy idea that we should go out and see if we could find any of the others. In case they needed help. But I think we both knew that the chances of finding anyone and being able to help them, or of getting back to our tent later, were nil.
By 9pm the tent was feeling quite cosy. Sarah had brought half a bottle of red wine in a plastic bottle, which we had finished between us. And I had shared my gran's secret recipe flap-jacks, which were basically all sugar and treacle. The weather was still horrible, but the tent was holding up and only leaking a bit around the zips.
Huddled together we agreed to try and get some sleep. But It felt like I was awake all night. I was hoping that the weather would be clear in the morning. And turning over all the possibilities in my mind seemed like a long continuous waking dream, with the howling wind and battering rain as a constant accompaniment.
Some time after 4am the wind dropped a bit and I must have dozed off, because I woke again at about 6am. It was still raining, but only lightly. Sarah seemed to be asleep, but as soon as I moved to look outside she said good morning.
Compared to the previous day, the weather was good. We could maybe have tried to cook some breakfast. But without actually needing to say it, it was clear that we both wanted to pack up and get to safety as soon as possible. We ate what we could as we took down the tent and packed the soggy mess into our rucksacks.
By the time we were ready to move it had stopped raining. On any other day we would probably have set off feeling quite optimistic about finishing the trek and maybe getting back first. But today we were still worried about the others, and just wanted to get back before the weather had a chance to change again.
Walking was a lot easier now we could see where we were going. Any concerns I might have had about not going too fast for Sarah were quickly dispelled as it was she that was pushing the pace from the start. Mostly we walked in silence for the first hour or so. Whenever either of us tried to start a conversation the other was deep in thought, so we had to repeat the opener and it fell flat. But it didn't seem awkward. We were just in a hurry. If we hadn't had the rucksacks we would probably have run.
Later on I wondered if we should have just left the tent. Maybe if we hadn't made it back that would have haunted me in my dying moments. But we did make it back, obviously.
As it happened we didn't have to trek the whole way to Kirkby Stephen. After about 2 hours of walking we came across a caravan park. The owner gave us some very welcome cups of tea as we explained that we had been stuck out in the storm and were worried about the other groups that had departed just after us.
It was such a relief to be able to tell someone else. The lady immediately phoned the mountain rescue people and the police. It felt like we had done something to help, rather than just looking out for ourselves, which is what we basically decided was all we could do.
I remember looking at Sarah as she was drinking her tea and smiling. There was a kind of self-satisfaction in that moment that we had survived something using our own wits and some good teamwork. And we obviously hoped that everyone else would be fine too.
A policeman came within a few minutes to get some more details from us. Then he spent a while radioing messages to various people. Once he was done he gave us a lift to Kirkby Stephen, where we presumed we would be able to meet up with our colleagues. The original plan had been to meet there, have a meal and then get driven back to London. But we were told that we'd need checking out by a local medic and should probably not travel until Monday.
Luckily one of the pubs had rooms vacant so Sarah and I booked in and waited for news. It was a long day. We spent most of the morning in the lounge, until it started to get busy with people coming in for Sunday lunch. So we retreated to my room, but quickly got bored and ventured out to find a coffee shop.
At the door we were met by the policeman, Ken I think his name was, with news. I could tell immediately by his tone that it was not all good. He started with the less bad news. Nine of the other 10 trekkers had been found. Most of our colleagues were OK but had been taken to hospital suffering with varying degrees of exposure. Julie from sales, Sarah's team, also had a suspected broken ankle.
There was a pause.
Mr Morrison was still missing. His trekking partner Laura had been found in a terrible state. Physically she wasn't too bad, but she was an emotional wreck. All they could get out of her was that she had lost Mr Morrison in the mist. She had heard him cry out but couldn't find him. Then she just wandered until she stumbled across some kind of shelter.
We went to the hospital and saw everyone briefly. They all seemed, like us, to be glad it was all over and keen to get home. But they were all going to be kept in overnight, so Sarah and I went back to the hotel.
I can't remember when the policeman came back. Sometime in the evening. They had found Mr Morrison at the foot of some rocks, where it appeared he had fallen badly. He was dead. Ken didn't give us any more details.
It was a shock. After everyone else was found, I was hoping he would turn up OK too. Sarah cried a little. Neither of us knew him that well. I think it was the realisation of how lucky we had been that got to us.
I went to bed at about 10pm, expecting to sleep like a log. But I didn't. I was tired, but restless. Around 11 there was a soft knock on my door. It was Sarah. She said she didn't want to be alone. Neither did I.
Work gave us all two weeks off to recover. And when we came back they had found us a new manager. He was quiet and not the sort for doing team building exercises. There was a collection for Mr Morrison's family, but none of us went to the funeral.
The job had never been very important to me. And now it was awkward. Someone had mentioned how grateful they were that I had gone to get help. But it almost seemed sarcastic, as if they really thought I should have done something else. Maybe I was just projecting my doubts. It made me uncomfortable though.
And Sarah. We didn't talk about that weekend. What could be said? What difference would it make? It was what it was.
I left the company a few months later. That weekend changed me in ways I didn't understand at the time. I don't think I even understand it now.