In reply to Goucho:
> ...been that perfect Alpine moment - like something out of a Gaston Rebuffatt coffee table book...
Hmm... can't relate to any of that. But dog food? I can relate to that.
We landed in Cham in '75. But it was OK. We were still culturally in Yorkshire. And, just to make sure, there was a convenient signpost, 'Almscliff - 2 3/4 miles.'
We were sat in the Nash when Mick Hillas staggered back from the supermarket with loads of bottles.Chortling. "F*cking great! This pop's dead cheap." A swift glance at the aforesaid pop confirmed my guess. "It's dead cheap, Mick, cos it's not pop - it's water." "Watter!!! Don't give me that bollox. It's in a bottle." (You couldn't get bottled water in blighty back then.) "Well taste it yourself." And he did. "Watter! F*cking bastard watter!" Etc, etc, etc.
Well far be it from me to titter - of course I did. But when my mate Steve (well, no, actually he wasn't a mate at at all, we never got on) bought loads of 'dead cheap' chocolate at the same supermarket, the old red alert should have pinged. Turned out it was laxative chocolate. The trek back up to Plan de L'Aiguille left the forest littered with piles of shit.
And it didn't stop there. Even though we'd slung the chocolate, it didn't stop the shit. For the umpteenth time, I legged it from the tent and raced behind a now familiar boulder to void... Only to look up in horror at a couple of dozen hikers heading straight towards me. Nowhere to go, nowhere to run. I could only squat and shit and shit and shit. I wasn't going anywhere in a hurry.
The leader of the hikers looked up. His eyes met mine. There was a snort of Teutonic disgust, an "Ach!" He turned. Like some bloody conga, they all looked up, met my eyes, turned. And thankfully they all sodded off.
Naturally I never told Hillas. He'd have pissed himself laughing.
Dog food. Water, not pop. Laxative chocolate. Alpine provisions can be a vexed affair.
Mick