I've been using some of the new video clips from the BMC website on climbing wall award courses and on other climbing sessions. They are really useful in emphasising key skills to help climbers improve their grade and raise awareness about safety.

Take a look at the BMC pagesclick here

One of the great thngs about living in Shropshire is being able to get out and explore the rich and varied landscape that makes this county so interesting. If you've ever wondered is the Wrekin a volcano as you drive along the A5 towards Shrewsbury and onto North Wales, or why the Wenlock Edge is such a continuous limestone Edge, perhaps you should look at Shropshire Rocks click here - this is a great website that explains the geology of Shropshire.

I made reference to the Poisoned Glen on another page - why does it have this name? Well...Tory is an island off the coast of Donegal. The story is below.

Balor na Suíle Neimhe (Balor of the Evil Eye)

Balor was king in Tory. He had a daughter more beautiful than any eye could behold. Such was her radiance, and such were the ethics of the day, he imprisoned her in a tower, never to come within sight of man. But as things would have it, legend of her rapturous looks spread, and had the reverse effect. Balor was obviously unaware of the powerful effect of hype. Attempts on her tower became quite the thing among the men folk, and it wasn’t long before one succeeded in breaking in and taking her away.

Balor followed her across the seas to Magheroarty and stalked her captor across the mainland, killing him with a giant stone. One such stone stands in the entrance to the Poisoned Glen, and is said to be the evil, or poisoned, eye of Balor.

Want to hear the true story?

The Irish word for poison, “neimhe” (pronounced niv-uh), differs in its spelling by only one letter from the word for Heaven, “neamh” (pronounced nyow-uh). The glen used to be called the Heavenly Glen by local people, as it was, to them, like they imagined Heaven itself to be.

It was, predictably, an English cartographer who made the mistake in translation that was to ‘poison’ the name of one of Ireland’s most beautiful places for ever.

So now you know!