NOVEMBER 2022 · ADVENTURE
On the Black Hill: Dreams of Inversion
Black Mountains, Wales
The forecast said temperature inversion. That particular condition where cold air pools in the valleys and the higher ground sits clear above it, with a distinct layer between them. The photographs you get from that — mountain tops above cloud, other peaks floating like islands — are the reason people go to the lengths they go to. Camp the night before. Be there for the light.
What actually happened was fog. Undifferentiated, complete fog. The Hatterrall Ridge on the Wales-Herefordshire border buried in it by the time we reached the summit. The Black Hill: 640 metres, and about 640 metres of visibility.
Bruce Chatwin's novel sends twin brothers through their whole lives on a farm below this ridge. They never really leave. Looking out into the white from the summit, with the trail disappearing after twenty metres and the cairn barely visible, you could understand something about that kind of narrowing.
Looking out into the white from the summit, you could understand something about that kind of narrowing.
The Black Hill — November 2022
The tent went up on the rocky ridgeline in the fog. A moss-covered outcrop nearby. Windswept heather at the margins of the track. The camp felt very exposed and very enclosed at the same time — you could hear the fog moving.
In the morning: no sun. More fog. The inversion had not materialised. We had the ridge to ourselves for a while, then came the hikers, then a group with goats — actual goats — navigating the path with more confidence than anyone else out there. Gnarled trees on the slope below. A silhouette on the summit dissolving into white behind them.
A standing stone, barely discernible through the mist. A summit cairn that came and went depending on how the fog moved. Two hikers ahead of us on the ridge, visible and then not.
That's what we got. No inversion, plenty of fog.
Moss-covered rocky outcrop and tent on foggy moorland ridgeline
Hiker in yellow jacket standing by pitched tent on misty Welsh moorland
Silhouette of lone hiker on peak dissolving into thick fog and cloud
Windswept heather and trail vanishing into dense mist on moorland slope
Grassy hilltop with rocky summit emerging from swirling fog below
Rounded moorland hill cloaked in white mist and low cloud cover
Dead heather and gorse shrubs silhouetted against fog-obscured ridge
Weathered moorland vegetation fading into thick white mist above
Layered hilltops with lichen-covered rocks and green vegetation in fog
Gnarled wind-shaped tree emerging from low cloud and moorland grass
Summit cairn barely visible through dense fog on misty hilltop
Shadowy figure standing on peak surrounded by impenetrable white mist
Rolling moorland hills dissolving completely into thick blanket of fog
Hilltop with standing stone barely discernible in heavy mist and cloud
Two hikers on moorland ridge with rocky peak shrouded in dense fog ahead
Moorland slope with dark heather and misty hilltop looming above fog
Summit cairn and dying tree barely visible through thick fog and mist
Windswept trees on moorland slope with fog-enshrouded hills in distance
Hiker and goat on moorland with layered fog-wrapped peaks behind them
Goats on exposed moorland ridge with gnarled trees and fog-shrouded peaks