Sometimes, just sometimes we can bear to tear ourselves away and last weekend myself (OCUK Project Director) Lisa, (OCUK Project Officer) Ben from Rockhopper sea kayaking and Frazer from No Fuss Events headed down to Birmingham for the Outdoors Show. We met lots of people who had already been to the west highlands and islands and quite a few who hadn't. We gave away three cool Outdoor Capital prizes (campfire cookbooks, biking goody bags, maps, ccompasses etc etc), and generally had a nosy around what was new in the outdoors world.

Lisa rose to the Boy Scouts 'crate challenge', retiring with war wounds after her team stacked 11 crates and then crashed to the floor. The record was 18 crates high - believe me that's scary.

Whatever you think of Birmingham; and we liked the great Indian food, friendliness of the people plus the dignified civic buildings and funky modern ones, Brum isn't a beautiful city so I was glad to get back to the Highlands and snapped this pic of Loch Linnhe on my way into work on Tuesday.....it's snowing today (Wed 21st) and Jane the OCUK adminsitrator is up on the slopes at Nevis Range so fingers crossed this cold snap lasts until the weekend.

For more info on ski-ing go to the Outdoor Capital website.

Anna - OCUK Project Director