BEMAC is a small hillwalking club that exists to help members get out onto the hills and mountains regularly. Most of the members are based in Berwickshire in the Scottish Borders. Our planned day walks are on the third Sunday of the month.  We climb Munros, Corbetts, the Cheviot Hills, local Border Hills. We camp, bothy, backpack etc, etc. 

 

How BEMAC Began

The story of BEMAC starts around 1990 when Graham Dolan and Alan Marsh were both Scout Leaders in the 6th Berwickshire (Ayton) Scout Troop. For several years, the older Scouts and these two leaders had been involved in quite adventurous outdoor activities, such as hiking, camping, hostelling, backpacking and mountain climbing. The older Scouts around that time were involved in various expeditions which included walking in the Cheviots and climbing some of the Lake District fells. Scafell Pike, England’s highest mountain, was scaled on one occasion. There were various other mountain adventures in Scotland such as walking through the Lairig Ghru in the Cairngorms.

One problem was that when the Scouts reached the age of 16, there was no Venture Scout Unit in the area for them to move on to.
For a few years the older ex-Scouts who were still interested in the outdoors just joined in various Scout outdoor expeditions on an ad hoc basis. These young men, along with the Leaders, were developing a taste for climbing the Scottish mountains including some Munros as well as the Lake District fells.

By this time, the group, along with some other friends of the Scout Leaders and a parent, John McFarlane, began making regular weekend expeditions. They realised it would be advantageous to use mountain huts but to be able to do that necessitated becoming a member of the Mountaineering Council of Scotland (MCofS). Before a group can join the MCofS it needs to be properly constituted. It was decided to go down this path in order to gain access to the huts.
Those involved called a meeting of friends and a few others they knew may be interested, with a view to forming a proper club and at that meeting BEMAC was born.

At first the club had no name but at the suggestion of Matt Deeming, an original member, the acronym BEMAC was adopted. Originally it stood for Berwickshire East Mountain Activities Club, but nowadays the BE part is more likely just to mean BErwickshire.
In those early days, as well as those keen on mountain walking, there was a small group of older Scouts and ex-Scouts who were also keen on rock climbing. There were a good number of expeditions to Kyloe Crag and Bowden Doors in North Northumberland led by Matt Deeming, who had previous rock climbing experience.
The Activities part of BEMAC was included in the name (rather than just ‘mountaineering’) because when the club first started the rock climbing section was very active and there were indeed different activities going on. Sadly, the rock climbing didn’t last very long and the club became more of a mountain walking club which it remains to this day.