July 24th 2025
Introduction
On a recent camp site I was wary about children. Summer, ten o’clock at night, it’s still light, no fun hearing their shouts when you’re thinking about bed.
I spoke to someone about it. She ran the place, which meant collecting money and advising where to pitch. She recognised my concern and didn’t allow disturbing noise. Although silence, she said, was “painful” in the ear. It’s not, but I found it a curious remark.
It might seem painful if you are addicted to noise. The vibration, sensation, and external stimulus has stopped. Stay there, and you find calm and peace.
Silence can be a practice. It’s one of the pleasures of the hills and a feature of tennis, which I describe in this Footnotes.
I agree with Erling Kagge when he writes in his book Silence in the Age of Noise “the world’s secrets are hidden inside silence.”
Wimbledon Final
I rarely watch sport but find tennis interesting. Commentators study the game then explain the angles, difficulties, stylistic difference between players. My favourite was Federer with a grace and agility making him the best. Jannik Sinner in this year’s men’s final looks slight, the commentator said, but contains a lot of power.
Watch his serve and you see how it works. He’s supple, and bends backwards, so he gets the amplified weight of his body behind a strike. Carlos Alcaraz was strong but not such a strategist. I started watching Alcaraz, because it’s difficult observing and understanding both, then realised Sinner had more finesse and focussed on him.
In addition to being rubbish at football, I didn’t like it. I preferred the gym and long distance running but we rarely did that. There was a pleasant moment. “You’re a good runner” a boy said to me, who was known for being the best. There was a kind of mental switch and I switched it on. Click, I’m going to do this. The boy was surprised and I was too: that’s not part of my identify. These things have been studied by Timothy Gallwey in relation to tennis.
There are football moments you might say are artistic, hence “the beautiful game.” Most of it however is passing the ball around in a formation. It’s not solitary. You wonder about patterns on the field, vaguely interesting, but with tennis it’s immediate and constant. Switched on, so to speak, with the first serve.
The crowd cheers when a volley makes a return impossible, because the opponent is running the other way. The clever moments are thrilling because you don’t expect them; that’s where Federer excelled. He would receive the impact of a fast ball and softly redirect it left, right, wherever they couldn’t reach. It was unexpected, but he was reading the court.
That’s artistry, tennis is full of it, and you see it up close. You see the mental struggle of battling players and crowd applause when they chase a shot they can’t return, but do return, and win. Artistry, combined with will.
Tennis, more than football, connects with walking in the hills. It’s a psychological struggle against adversity, you against someone or something else, seen in the camera close up of players. They concentrate and control themselves. Bounce bounce, glance up, bounce again, then serve. “Focus on what’s important” a commentator said, and you saw it in Sinner’s face.
In the hills you keep going, when you’re exhausted, and eventually reach a summit. I don’t pursue that for its own sake, but it is part of the walking experience. “Ca va?” a Frenchman said to me in the Pyrenees because I was staggering, and needed to eat. “Oui, mais je suis fatigue.”
Tennis is soothing to watch and elegantly organised. Pleasant listening, green and white, a fast exchange, advantage, the crowd cheers with delight but then the essential part of it: quiet please.
Curious Words
I heard someone use the term “pre-politics” which is interesting. I think most people, most of the time, have an instinct for what is fundamentally wrong and are not notably political. If not, there’s a formula to apply. Ask yourself is it necessary, is it true, and is it kind?
What happens, unfortunately, is situations are jumped on by people who don’t have that instinct, and are thoroughly political, who think they have answers in the form of ideology. Belief, not fact, like believing a train will arrive in ten minutes. It might, it might not, and the instability means you don’t know.
That’s how the world works, unfortunately, and it’s getting worse. Differences are asserted and fought, which is the opposite to commonality. Things fall apart, said W.B. Yeats. You probably know the line, and the rest of his poem.
Featured Walks
Loweswater is a popular area adjoining Butermere. Above Buttermere you find one of the best walks in the Lake District, staying high, with good views both sides. That’s what you see in my photograph.
Here it is, up there, in a wintry spring. Not entirely quiet, I now use a muffling device, but also think some wind noise adds to the authenticity of a video.
Melbreak, here, is a smaller hill enjoyable because it’s quiet. Few people walk there and you feel you’re on the edge of the Lake District and its crowds. You see Scotland in the distance.
Melbreak is heathery and steep. I couldn’t find an easy path, possibly how it is, and found myself pushing up through it, pulling on the plants, until I reached the summit.
In Snowdonia, there are small areas worth knowing. I walked here a few years ago and enjoyed the hills, although I recoil from the Blaneau mining scars. I find it very depressing seeing slate waste not a beautiful hillside. I don’t think it bothers other people too much, so you can probably ignore me.
I’m not sure where this is in Scotland – Stob a Choin – but this is how I plan my walks. If it looks good, I’ll go there. I’m not interested in completing all the hills in an area, wherever it is, and don’t for example extend a route just slightly for the sake of a Munro, if there’s no visual interest. L’amour de la beaute, as they say in France.
Conclusion
Silence is one of the pleasures of the hills. For no particular reason I remember how I stopped walking, and enjoyed it, below Great End in the Lake District. I’d climbed the valley from Borrowdale, and Great Gable was the plan, then paused my footsteps to listen: nothing.