Rubble Trouble

Imagine that you live in a beautiful house, with a beautiful garden and a beautiful view. You may also wish to imagine a beautiful partner but that's not necessary for the scenario. Suppose that one day you look out from your window and see that someone has dumped a large pile of rubble at the end of your garden, partially obscuring the beautiful view. What would you do? Would you accept that some people dump rubble and there's nothing to be done about it, or would you investigate and try to remove most of the rubble?

That is the situation I encounter at the top of most hills that I climb. As far as I know there was no co-ordinated project to dump piles of rubble on top of every hill to celebrate fifty years of hill lists or the anniversary of someone dying. I suspect that most of the rubble has stealthily accumulated over the years. Most of the piles probably started off as innocent little cairns and have mutated into monstrosities over the years. Some of them may have had some practical value at one time but if so they are redundant in the GPS and database era.

I know that not everyone sees things the same way. That's fine. I am not proposing any co-ordinated centenary clean-up campaign. All I am suggesting is that people pay attention and think for themselves. If anyone else wishes to adjust the appearance of some summits, I recommend adding a pair of gardening gloves to the rucksack. Hills do not belong to any particular point of view, so anyone who likes large piles of rubble can make them bigger if they wish. Some photographs may help people judge for themselves... Full illustrated article