The Association of British Members of the Swiss Alpine Club (ABMSAC) is a national UK mountaineering club with a strong interest in alpine mountaineering, particularly in Switzerland.
There are two categories of membership, ordinary and affiliate. Both entitle members to participate in all ABMSAC activities (climbing meets and social events) in the UK and abroad. Ordinary members, who pay an additional fee, are members of the Swiss Alpine Club and receive additional benefits.
Membership of the ABMSAC also provides affiliation to the British Mountaineering Council(BMC). This entitles members to purchase comprehensive mountaineering insurance through the BMC insurance scheme www.thebmc.co.uk.
Our objectives are to encourage the natural progression to climbing in the Alps through membership of the Swiss Alpine Club and to provide opportunities as a British Club for members to meets together and enjoy mountaineering activities both in Britain and the Alps.
The Association organises a comprehensive programme of meets throughout the year.
During the winter months there is a series of meets in Scotland to make best use of any snow and ice conditions. During the rest of the year there are meets in England and Wales, typically in the Lake District, North Wales, Yorkshire, Dartmoor and the Peak District. These meets are based in climbing huts or bunkhouses.
The annual Family Meet in the Peak District at the Whit Bank Holiday is a camping meet.
The highlights of the year are the Alpine Meets. Every year there is a meet in the Alps based on reasonably priced hotel or self-catering accommodation. There is a separate camping meet and at the end of the season the annual alpine walking tour using climbing huts and bunkhouses.
The Association does not provide any formal mountaineering or climbing training but members have a wealth of experience that they are happy to pass on to the less experienced.
Social Events
During the winter The Association promotes a series of lectures in London. These are held at a pub in South Kensington and the programme is run in conjunction with the London sections of three other major mountaineering clubs.
We hold our Annual Dinner and AGM in Patterdale at the end of January/start of February.
There is a Family Meet in the spring and an Alpine Reunion
Meet in the autumn. There is also an annual Hut Maintenance Meet, though this is not strictly a social event.
Publications
All members of the Association receive a quarterly Newsletter to keep them up to date with activities and events. In addition the Annual Journal is published each spring with a full review of members’ activities over the previous year.
Whos who on the Committee
The President - John Dempster CB -
John’s liking for the outdoors began when he was a Scout, walking and camping on Dartmoor and youth hostelling in the Lake District. At college he joined the Oxford University Mountaineering Club and climbed with them in Wales, the Lakes and Scotland. He joined the SAC in 1967 and visited the Alps regularly thereafter. He climbed many of the classic 4,000 meter peaks including Mont Blanc and the Matterhorn (twice). Many of these climbs were done on, or following, ABMSAC meets, often with Roger James.
Although brought up in Devon his parents were Scottish and family holidays were regularly spent in Dundee. His father introduced him to the joys and miseries of Munro collecting. His first was Schiehallion which he climbed at the age of 14, direct from Kinloch Rannoch, which is one of the most tedious and unrelenting grass slopes in Scotland, and which nearly put him off Munros for ever. But the seeds were sown and he completed the Munros 35 years later.
Much of his working life was spent with the Ministry of Transport and he was made a CB in 1994. He left the UK Civil Service in 1996 when he was appointed Director of the Bahamas Maritime Authority. He is currently Director of the UK Major Ports Group.
Two hip replacements mean that he is not now as agile as he was but he is still a regular attender at ABMSAC meets north of the Border and can still be observed, in good weather on top of a Munro.
Ed Bramley - Membership Secretary Hi everybody, I joined the Association in 1981. I am the Membership Secretary for the Association, looking after new members as well as subs renewal. On the personal front, I'm in my mid forties, live in West Yorkshire, and have a family of two children.
I started climbing and walking in the Peak District in my teens, when hitching lifts and sleeping in barns were the order of the day. I also learnt navigation the hard way, over the peat bogs of Kinder. In my University years, I specialised in glaciology, and was involved for two summers in studying the Gorner glacier above Zermatt. More recent exploits include biking the C2C Whitehaven to Sunderland mountain bike route, and completing the A class of the Welsh 1000m peaks in under 7 hours.
John Foster - Meets Organiser
I live in Lancashire, and joined the ABMSAC in 1990. Since then my wife, Marj, and I have been frequent attendees on the Scottish winter meets - although I have to confess we often go b&b rather than bunkhouse. I organised of the Scottish Meets for a couple of years and in 2004 took on the role of Meets Secretary.
We have been lovers of the Alps for many years, but are walkers rather than climbers, interested in the flora and fauna of the area as well as the mountain scenery, and in my case am also a fan of mountain railways.
