Having had to cancel last month’s extended Probus walk because of heavy snow, this month we embarked on a circular 7mile walk that started with a steep climb up to Beamsley Beacon. The Beacon (400metres above sea level) has long views over Wharfedale and associated moorland. It’s a tough start for a walk, with frequent breaks to look at the views (even when there weren’t any, due to low mist!). As we pressed on beyond the snow line (well, there were small patches of snow in sheltered spots!), we reached the Beacon – apparently a Bronze Age burial site and subsequently a warning beacon for a possible Napoleonic invasion! Our photo shows a more modern use – as a photo opportunity! (Bill, our walk leader is taking the photo)
Walking on across the moor along an encouragingly clear, straight path (with interesting stone boundary markers), our spirits rose (as did the sun – now a glorious morning).
Our luck ran out, as did the path, but we persevered along a 4X4 track past an impressive line of Grouse butts. Lots of grouse/grouses/grice rose at our feet as we walked along. Confident enough to take a ‘short cut’, we encountered a T junction of paths where we were expecting a crossroads. We were faced with the option of a shorter but more upward path towards the Beacon, and then back – or a gently downward sloping path that took us in the wrong direction. Easy choice!
Having reached the outskirts of Ilkley (it seemed), we found a path and then a lovely minor road leading us back to the cars. Contrary to repeated reassurances that ‘the hardest part has been done’, ‘it’s all downhill from now on’, and ‘it’s just over the next hill/round the next corner’ we encountered a hill or two (or three) on our return leg before completing our 8 (not 7!) mile walk. We could see kites and buzzards (but not vultures) circling in the thermals above the Beacon – so it was a narrow escape from the Beamsley Beast!
We managed a rather late but excellent lunch at the Station Hotel, Birstwith – to complete a fabulous walk.

The club’s financial year is drawing to a close, and March 21st is the date of our AGM – fast approaching.

AGM stands for Annual General Meeting – not Angle Grinder Man, which is my role in this Blog!
Club AGMs can be a bit boring/formal, but this one definitely won’t be! This is a special year for the club – our 25th anniversary, and still going strong!

According to Derek, our Club Archivist, our club’s first meeting was on March 10th, 1993, and of the original 54 members, 7 are still active members of the club, with a further 3 remaining as honorary members!
To have 10 of the original 54 members still in contact with us after 25 years is quite a record for a club.

We’ll be celebrating at the AGM with a special buffet, and with some special guests, including the Deputy Mayor of Harrogate and representatives of the two other Probus Clubs in Harrogate.

We currently have 69 members, but are always looking for new members, and subsequent friends.

There’s so much in a Probus year;
• About 25 club meetings with interesting and very different speakers,
• A similar number of Probus walks in our lovely local countryside, and
• Some very special social events, spread throughout the year – topped off with a lot of informal contact between members!

It’s a way of life – and all for £45 a year!

Come and join us soon – see this website for details.

Well that was a new experience!

My Probus friend, Fishing Bill (as opposed to Walking Bill, often mentioned in these musings), invited me round to try to teach me how to tie trout fishing flies. I believe that in the best circles this skill is called ‘fly dressing’, though tying, or tangling, seems a bit more appropriate to my first attempts!

Bill first demonstrated how to tie three different flies – a partridge and orange, a nymph and a spider. Don’t these flies have great names – and they look so wonderful (to me at least!), representing as they do different insects in various life stages.
Two of these flies I’ve seen Bill catch trout on, and using one of them even I caught a trout once!

As far as I can appreciate, flies are tied by putting layers onto the shank of a fish hook (hence the term ‘dressing’) – first an initial layer of silk thread, wound round the shank and then secured at one end. Then a copper wire is wound sparsely over the silk to represent the insect’s body structure, and then a feather or similar to represent the wings or legs of the insect – according to the insect being imitated. I’m sure there’s a lot more complexity than that, but Bill’s being very gentle with me – it’s on a need to know basis!

Well, I’m still at stage 1 – trying to tie off the silk thread without it unravelling! I could blame my eyesight for the difficulties I’m experiencing, or my lack of dexterity in poking the threads under (or is it over?) each other to secure them. Or maybe I’m not patient enough. I’m a bit more ‘ball-park’ than ‘exact’, as a personality.

The process reminds me a bit of learning how to tie a bowline knot when in the school scout group. Learning then was accompanied by an incantation that went something like ‘pretend you’re a rabbit – make a loop, go through the loop, round the tree and back through the hole’.

It doesn’t work for fly tying – so far!

It is, however, an illustration of how wonderful our Probus Club is in the selfless sharing of experience, the mental stimulation and the enjoyment – and in this case also the anticipation of catching a trout on a fly that you’ve ‘dressed’ yourself!

Here’s hoping!

It was one of those unsolicited phone calls that we’re supposed to dread, block, avoid …. The car dealership where I had bought my current car, getting on for three years ago. Would you like to review your account with us (meaning – would you like to trade up, presumably?)

Usually I’d say no, pleasantly, and put the phone down – but why shouldn’t I? A bit of a daydream, imagining myself behind the wheel of a new car, with that wonderful smell inside that takes some of the sting out of having parted with a lot of money, and seen the value of the new purchase drop like a stone as soon as you drive it out of the dealership!

So, a few days later sees me sipping a coffee, talking to two energetic, smart young men about how it would really be cheaper to get a new car (more economical, packed full of gizmos), and didn’t I deserve it, after a lifetime of toil… (that’s me talking!)

A brief look around, and sit in, a new model showed that the direct replacement car would feel very much like the current one (that’s a plus for me!). It’s got a bigger engine, bigger screen for accessing loads of functions (most of which I haven’t used yet or can’t imagine the need for) better lights, smoother lines etc. etc.

Then there’s the drama – the salesmen disappear into the ‘office’ section of the showroom, accessing the systems that work out how much it would all cost. Time passes… The first computer ‘prediction’ is way too expensive. Another is set in motion, still way above my current payments but £100 a month cheaper, and only a brief summary provided– not the details of where the ‘discounts’ have come from…..

Where will this drama end? Still thinking about it…..

At this stage of life one is tempted to either:
• stick with the current car, leaving a bit more income every month with which to spoil myself and my wife in other ways, or
• SKI (spend the Kids Inheritance), such as it is, and take out a long term finance deal with a large amount to pay off at the end of the deal (thinking that I might be dead before then, and the unpaid bit would be void!)

Decisions Decisions….!

Members continue to enjoy a wonderful series of Probus talks, organised by our Speaker-Finder, Peter

The talks are so important for the Club- they are the centrepiece of our activities, enabling us every two weeks to come together, to meet regular friends and new members – and lots of the discussion is around the latest talk topic.

Our latest talk was about Istanbul, and as usual we learnt a lot about the subject – located half in Europe and half in Asia. Often it’s the little anecdotes that stay in the memory, and the links they make to contemporary life in the UK.

I’ve never been to Istanbul, though many members had, and already knew quite a lot about this beautiful historic city.

• I didn’t know, for instance, that Istanbul (meaning ‘City of Islam’), was only named such in the 15th century, with the Ottoman Empire. Founded in 500BC as Byzantium, it had already been renamed Constantinople when that Roman Emperor became a Christian and made it the capital of his Empire.

• I did know that it’s a city of many mosques, but hadn’t appreciated that, among the wealthy individuals who would pay for mosques to be built, there was competition to build a number of associated minarets (for the call to prayer) to be built.

Apparently the more minarets ‘your’ mosque had, the more respect you gained, with the only limitation being that the mosque in Mecca had to have the most (there were six minarets there). In the case of one of the mosques built in Istanbul, a language problem occurred during its construction, and six minarets were duly built, instead of two! After some consideration, a solution to the dilemma was found – for the rich individual to pay for an additional minaret to be built at the mosque in Mecca!

For me there were a couple of tenuous links to the current day.

• Brexit seems to have put the UK into an Istanbul-like situation. We’re going to be more formally not quite European, and yet not Atlantic /USA focused either. Maybe Boris’s recently proposed bridge across the Channel was a historical reference to that beautiful (UK designed) suspension bridge across the Bosphorus that linked Europe and Asia?

• President Trump’s recent interchange with the leader of North Korea, when he referred to ‘his nuclear button being bigger than Kim Jong Il’s’, doesn’t seem as good an approach to politics as constructing another minaret! (though the towers do look a bit like rockets….)

Makes you think, doesn’t it – our Probus talks always do!

Well it’s been quite a week!

I had been referred by my GP to our local hospital outpatients because I had a very low resting pulse rate.  At my appointment the consultant said I should have a pacemaker fitted – and would Thursday be OK?

Having expected to be told that they would monitor it, and I should come back in 3 months time – you can imagine my reactions! I’d come for a consultation, not a rather imminent insertion of a new part!

The next few days were spent in a bit of a spin – lots to think about, only relieved by a really excellent extended Probus walk on Tuesday, based around Summerbridge. The fog/mist rather obscured the long range views, but the mud down by the river made up for that!

Then I spent 12 hours at the LGI on Thursday, including having;
• an MRI scan of my heart (fascinating!),
• a pacemaker fitted under a local anaesthetic, and
• 3 hours ‘recovery’ time to ensure that all was now OK

All very impressive, and I felt hardly any pain – just a slight feeling, while a ‘pocket’ was created in my chest for the new device, of being a steak that was being tenderised!

Wonderful, super- prompt care. Couldn’t be more grateful.

So now Probus has a robo-president, able to leap tall buildings with a single bound – well, next week maybe!
This should be useful for the next Probus walk – especially if there’s any mud!