GOODBYE KENNY TAIT - AND ALL THAT

John Ritchie

 

Life here at Leeming MRT has just changed forever. Today we say goodbye to Kenny Tait, off to join all those other pensioners out there in the Big Bad World. No more awful jokes, no more the lunchtime runs that take two hours, no more the cry of “I’m too busy”, and at last, the smell of liniment has gone from the PS locker room.

            To send him on his way, the escape committee organised a final weekend for him at Windermere in the Lake District. The Ladyholme Centre was booked, secret invitations sent, scheming and plotting carried out, and off we went. By 9 o’clock on Friday evening, past and present members of the Mountain Rescue Service had descended upon the bothy, taking Kenny with them into Bowness for a few quiet drinks. Some time later, after a few quiet and quite a few not so quiet drinks, they returned to the kitchen where they spent the next two hours telling each other jokes and stories, very loudly.

            Saturday 11 May saw Kenny and his guests off on his last great Lakeland scrambling adventure, a mass ascent of Jakes Rake on Pavey Arc in the Langdales. After a few false starts, Kenny, callsign Tango 1, led a motley collection of hung-over characters up the steep face of the mountain. On reaching the summit, he was greeted by Brian Morgan and Dave Barrington, long-time friends from Langdale/Ambleside MRT. They had set up a small table with waiter service and red wine. This was a generous gesture from Brian and Dave, two superb characters from the civilian mountain rescue world. Having consumed all the red wine, Kenny & Co. set off on a short stagger. Somehow, the intrepid Jason Taylor and his hill party had made it to the same location, despite planning a totally different route.

            The rest of the team were out training proper, and returned from their planned routes by half-past six, in time for a farewell dinner that had been prepared by Carole Bain and Gareth Davies. After a fantastic meal, the team toasted Kenny and prepared for the forthcoming social evening.

            Organisation of that had been left, once again, to the intrepid Jason Taylor. This resulted in one of those outrageous evenings where everybody went out in fancy dress. It also resulted in the DTL praying that we weren’t called out, or having to explain to the Station Commander on the following Monday why he’d had to bust the whole team out of the local police station.

            Later, in fact much later, after an evening in that den of iniquity know to all MR troops as The Wheelhouse, Kenny & Co. returned somewhat the worse for wear, but at least there had been no callout and none of them had been arrested. Once again, Kenny told the same old jokes and the banter went on and on, louder and louder, until they had cooked all the eggs, had nothing left to eat, and went to bed.

            Sunday the 12^th arrived with many of the troops waking up with hangovers. Kenny and guests set off once again, this time for a last flight in the good old yellow taxi, care of RAF Boulmer. As usual, this was cancelled when some unfortunate soul parted company with his mountain bike on Skiddaw. After a very slow walk round Easdale Tarn, it was back to the bothy for tea, or was it? One of the great traditions of mountain rescue is ‘swimming’, an event usually carried out upon the person about to leave. This is not an unexpected event, however. As Kenny is now a pensioner we could hardly physically hurl him into the nearest lake. After careful consideration, the escape committee (Jason Taylor, Lui Llewellyn, Chris Hufton) hit upon the old ‘warrior goes to Valhalla in a boat’ routine, in true Viking style.

            This involved the modification of a small dinghy, 25 feet of cord, a few troops with ice axes, one very cold lake and a small home-made sail. Kenny was carried to the waiting boat. He set off at a quick paddle hoping to avoid the inevitable ducking. At 20 feet out, the cord attached to the boat’s inflation valve was given a sharp pull, and down went the boat, taking Kenny with it. Lui wanted things to go with a bang, but fortunately we removed the pyros and propane from his person before setting him off on his little adventure.

            Kenny will soon be taking up employment with Adrenaline, an outdoor activities centre. Leeming MRT wishes him and his family a prosperous and successful future.