Monday 10 April 2017

Event History - Margaret Manley & Crickhowell Youth Hostel

 Bob Manley, who first did the Three Peaks Trial in 1964, looks back at when the event started and was based at the now closed Crickhowell Youth Hostel. The Youth Hostel was also run by his Mum, Margaret Manley
 

 For the full newspaper article (from 1972)  CLICK HERE


BOB MANLEY WRITES: I was for a while the youngest person ever to do the Three Peaks Trial. I was twelve in 1964, when it all started from Crickhowell Youth Hostel, where my mum was the warden. 

I joined a party of scouts from Birmingham that stayed in the hostel. The leader was quite laid back, and we started quite late. We climbed Sugar Loaf, and then the Skirrid, then back into Abergavenny where the leader decided to take us all into Quo Vardis Fish and chip shop for tea. We were probably in there for up to an hour, so we didn’t start to climb the Blorenge till after 5pm. 

We never did find the trig point on the top, as by this time it was getting dark. We made the rough descent from the top down to the Blaenavon road, where Chris Barber (the event founder) who was out looking for us picked me up in his car and returned me to Crickhowell. The rest of the scouts carried on walking, and arrived back about 8.30. Happy days....

The article above is from The Abergavenny Chronicle when mum was about to retire from the hostel. N.B. I get a mention in the article, although I’m christened Robert, mum always called me Robin but am now known as Bob.