DARK PEAK NEWS Winter 2012 - Dark Peak Fell Runners

Dark Peak News Winter 2012 page 51Made in the Dark Peak...being the page where we showcase notable Dark Peakartefacts, oddities and curios...No 9 Will McLewin’s Dark Peak camper vanWill’s flair for painting things in Dark Peak colours reached its apotheosis with thedaubing of Back Tor trig, (the story is finally chronicled elsewhere in this edition). Thisvan carried his artistic talents far and wide - to many a fell race in the late eighties andearly nineties, and across the Alps as he bagged the 4,000 metre peaks for his famousbook.* Sadly, its conception owes more to pragmatism than to spiritual inspiration. “Itwas an old van when I bought it and it was red,” said Will. “I thought ‘I’m not drivinground in a f****n’ red van’ so I painted it brown. Then I thought I might as well go thewhole hog and make it Dark Peak.” For some reason these colours picqued the curiosityof HM Constabulary, who stopped him at least half a dozen times, presumably on the snifffor hippy drugs. “Finally I snapped. I grabbed a club vest from the back, gave this youngcopper an earful, told him this is why it’s brown, yellow and purple, now F**k Off anddon’t stop me again!” Amazingly, Will was neither arrested nor ever pulled up again. Thevan finally gave up the ghost after being thrashed round Slovenia as the tour bus for Will’swind quintet in 1992. He then bought a Ford Transit, got the brown paint out again butnever quite finished the stripes.*Although the van no longer exists, the book does. You can find ‘In Monte Viso’sHorizon’ on Amazon, where it gets two five-star reviews. It’s yours for £15.73 if you fancya late Christmas present.