GW/MW-032 Access/Routes Enquiry

Hi Guys

I notice there is no activation notes on the summits page for GW/MW-032 Upper Park. Does anyone have any info on this hill with regard to access restrictions and possible routes.

73 Glyn

There is no access Glyn. The summit is on private land and the Powis Castle Estate has a long track record of refusing permission whenever it is requested.

It has been activated, a small number of times. I know that M0TUB and 2E0YYY managed to meet an estate employee who allowed them onto the summit. GW4BVE also managed to get a permission some years earlier.

I have written to the estate office and Lord Powis himself several times but never succeeded in gaining permission, although it was once mentioned that permission is very occasionally granted for charitable events.

I’m interested too. I plan to compete GW/MW and GW/SW in the coming few years, I’ve already finished GW/NW.

No access is normally granted to Upper Park. It’s a closed hill. There are no public rights of way near the summit and no access land.

Mike 2E0YYY got access a couple of years back and others have activated it using what I might describe as “Stealth Access”… :wink:

If you get anything other than a flat “no” from the Powys Estate I’d be surprised and pleased.

I’m trying to find a local contact through friends of friends to get in, more likely to have success that way. You could always sign up for a Pheasant shoot… (joking of course).

I’d be amazed if any access was granted other than in the closed season for game bird shooting and outwith the rearing period. So probably late autumn, early winter.

And at this point, sadly, you now know you need permission Glyn. So should you activate it, it would be reasonable for someone to challenge you to prove you had permission and if you cannot then they can effectively put the MT in a position where we would have little choice but to ask you to withdraw the log. Likewise, everyone reading this message now knows this and the wonderful software we use will let the MT check who has read this should anyone pop up and grab it on the quiet.

I don’t like the situation anymore than anyone else. I love there to be general access for all countries like there is to the majority of Scotland. In this case the landowner is exercising their right to withhold access. Our rules say “Activators must ensure that they have any necessary permission to operate from their chosen Summit, or that access is customary.”

I think the word that describes the position for many would be activators is “snookered”. We know we need permission and we know it’s not given.

I totally agree Andy - one of the things I loved about walking in Scotland is the freedom to roam. Maybe one day. Its a shame that the NT only own the castle and not all the land because the NT has a policy of public access to all.
73 Glyn

Are you saying that if an activator genuinely “doesn’t know” that permission for access is required, then the activation will be accepted - even without permission?

Surely this can’t be right, and it places people who have taken the trouble to research the access conditions at an unfair disadvantage.

73,
Walt (G3NYY)

The problem as I see it, Walt, is that the MT has many things to do - like bringing on line more Associations - and policing activations, querying if permission has been obtained etc, will only make life harder for us. Expanding the policy beyond a pimple in Wales, how many summits worldwide cannot be accessed? There may be hundreds or thousands of them, but how would we know?

It is a matter of honour. In the GR the preamble to 3.7 puts the onus on the activator to establish that access is permitted, and this is returned to in the Code of Conduct, 3.7.3. Deliberate trespass breaches the code and can attract a penalty.

In some cases owners have asked us to remove summits from our list. We have refused. The list is based on physical characteristics and does not imply access, also access is something that can change at a moments notice, which doesn’t happen with height and prominence.

What it boils down to is that where we know that a private summit has been accessed without permission then we are prepared to void the activation and even impose penalties, but it is up to interested parties to bring infractions to our attention.

Brian

Good answer!

73,
Walt (G3NYY)