I’m not sure whether to pity or to envy students from the cross-country club at Leeds University. They decided to spend New Year’s Eve at Britain’s highest pub — the Tan Hill Inn.
That’s when the snowstorm struck, cutting them off from the outside world. According to a story in the Guardian:
Student Nathan Martin said that spirits had remained high.
“It’s been fun – like the ultimate lock-in,” he said.
The inn’s assistant manager Mike Carter said: “Everyone’s had a good time – people were peeling carrots and potatoes and helping to make dinner on an evening. It was a really nice atmosphere.
After two days behind 7-foot-high snowdrifts, supplies of draught beer were running low — they only had one brand left. But they’re still doing better than some:
An even longer siege by the weather is still under way at Cape Wrath on Scotland’s north-western tip, where John Ure, 57, is waiting for his wife Kay to return with the ingredients for Christmas dinner. Mrs Ure went shopping in Durness, 11 miles away by boat and car, on 19 December but the road was then closed by snow and she has been holed up in a friend’s caravan ever since.
“I’m looking forward to a belated Christmas dinner but it might be Burns’ Night – 25 January – before it happens,” she said. She has regularly phoned her husband, who has ample supplies and has promised not to open any Christmas presents until she gets back.
In an era where we take international travel (even with the in(s)ane security requirements) pretty much for granted, it’s humbling to remember that, a few hundred years ago, most people rarely left the villages where they were born. And if they did, it was a major journey, with no guarantee they would return.
Pretty amazing that extreme weather can enforce that same mentality, even today.
Grant Hamilton
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