Whatever I did this morning has gone out of my head, swamped by Mary's news this afternoon. I knew she had cancer, but further tests have revealed the extent of it and the prognosis isn't good. I hope to meet her for lunch and a chat on Monday, if hospital appointments allow.

I met Mary at the Women's Trad Festival in August 2016, a BMC event to encourage women to climb outdoors. Her car was parked next to me and she was cleaning her teeth behind it, so we got chatting and she pitched her tent next to mine... which was a sensible move as she had no cooker. I made her cups of tea all weekend!

She was at the event as a Leader so we didn't actually climb together until the Sunday, when we could split into groups as we fancied. The extra is of me at Bamford, two days after I met her, carrying Mary's rope :-)

It's all going to take some thinking about, she's a well loved character and we've done a lot of stuff together.