Aberfan

 

A clock.

Its hands pointing at a little after 9.13.
This was in the morning
The morning of 21st October 1966

The clock looks a bit battered.
It looks grimey.
Encrusted with black soot... 

The clock stopped permanently at the above time, when it was engulfed in an avalance of coal dust, which had come crashing down from a 111 ft high spoil heap, outside the Welsh mining town of Aberfan. 

The collapse claimed the lives of 116 children and 28 adults.
109 of the children were killed when their primary / elementary school was engulfed.

Lest we forget

Blogoversary - 18 years of blogging

 I vividly remember this day in 2004, when I was in the then Youth Hostel in Kyleakin, 75 miles southeast of Stornoway, clattering away at the keyboard. I had set up Northern Trip whilst in Kirkwall, Orkney, about 10 days before - but started to keep a diary in earnest on October 8th. On that day, I had travelled to Strathaird for a walk towards Camus Fhionnairidh. That is a beautiful beach on the southern side of Skye, overshadowed by the awe-inspiring Cuillin mountains. These rear up to more than 3,000 feet above sealevel; not Alpine in height, but certainly Alpine from a mountaineering point of view. 

On the subject of blogging, I have kept a blog going since that day, although at the moment my posts are few and far between. After AOL pulled its blogging service in 2008, I changed to Blogger and Atlantic Lines. In 2018, I changed over to this blog, A Cobbled Road. I had satellite blogs, such as The Shell Gallery and a private blog. All these are now archived, following developments in the background. 

I hope to be able to continue to blog, whatever the future holds. 

Thank you for being there.