I will be delivering a hill skills workshop now on Sunday 25th March at the spring gathering for mountaineering ireland. The theme is 'learn skills to enjoy the hills' and I will be looking at how to plan your day or route dependant on weather forecast, looking at gear, emergency procedures and basic navigation. I certainly hope to see some of you there 👍.

The next Lowland Leader course I will be running is on the Sheep's head this March 17th and 18th. I only have 4 more spaces available for this course, if anyone is interested please email me at juliereeveswalking@gmail.com for further information.

After discussing hillwalking techniques with guys doing a mountain skills course recently I explained to them that there are actually a huge amount of people who hill walk and are prone to injury due to walking incorrectly. The below skills video on the Mountaineering Ireland website demonstrates walking skills, incorporating some of these into your daily hillwalking could possibly save you injury and increase your hillwalking years.... After all we do it because we love it and want to get the benefits for years to come 😉.

Great news..... I've now included a Mountain Skills 1 course onto the MI calendar for the 6th and 7th of January for anyone who may be interested in learning navigation skills. Also up are the next Lowland leader award course and the Lowland Leader assessment... I'm spoiling you really 🙂

I ran a Lowland Leader course the weekend down on the Sheep's Head peninsula and what a weekend it was, seems like we got the best of the Irish weather compared to everywhere else. The guys came up with 2 spectacular walks and on the Saturday we did the Tooreen trailhead which took in the Light house and the Poet's way. Unfortunately Bernies Cup An Tae was closed for the Winter but we did look at the Signal tower, the lighthouse and the poets way after the poet Denis M Cronin from Eskeraha. Along the way we found a plaque inscribed with the followng poem which he'd written. ... From Pole to pole should my migration bend, Or twice around the earth should extend. No place in all those travels could be found To my mind's eye, so adequately crowned. With natures diadems,serene, profuse, As these romantic and unrivalled views. On Sunday we then took in the Farranamanagh loop and the Funeral path, we looked at sweat houses and bardic schools. For more information on this take a look at the below link...... http://sheepsheadplaces.net/bardic-school-dromnea You can also find out more about the Sheeps Head Way at the below link.... http://www.thesheepsheadway.ie/

The Lowland Leader Award is for anyone interested in taking out groups into the lowland areas of Ireland and the UK. This course looks at group management, hazards, flora and fauna. Anyone wanting to do this course must first register with Mountaineering Ireland to be able to attend as there are requirements for attending.

The Mountain Skills 1 course is for any hillwalkers who are interested in becoming more confident and self sufficient on the mountains of Ireland. Prior registration is needed with Mountaineering Ireland to attend this course.

Ladies attending an intermediate navigation skills course with myself at the Women With Altitude weekend 3 years ago

Can't recommend this girl highly enough.... A great role model for women 🙂.

Currently at Plas Y Brenin in the beautiful Snowdonia National Park attending the Mountain Training Association Conference. Yesterday was spent scrambling on Tryfan learning new rope skills and today we did a workshop on effective marketing for the outdoors which covered different types of social media. Great weekend learning new skills and making new friends with like minded people.

A beautiful day yesterday in Killarney National Park with Arcadia College. Took the guys up to Torc Waterfall and then around some of the peninsula talking about the ecology within the park. We looked at some native red deer and also talked about the Killarney Strawberry Tree, the geological fault line running through the peninsula.... Including the species found on the sandstone and the difference on the limestone, we also looked at the Yew woods which have an Annex I priority habitat EU rating. Great day ☺