A pointless ‘walkers shelter now disfigures the remains of the broch.....
Image credit: Robert Gladstone
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That thing you describe as a "walker's shelter" wasn't erected upon the ruins of Dun Borve "nowadays". Those stones were already well-mossed and lichened in that position 22 years ago when I ate my lunch there.
By the time it would take a "walker" to shift the massive weight of stone into the construction you refer to as a "walker's shelter", any self respecting walker (or group of walkers) would already be warm and dry by the fire in a hostelry in Portree with a large Talisker having already digested a deep-fried meally pudding. What you refer to as a "walker's shelter" would offer no "walker" any shelter! It was no soft shite who shifted those tons of stone and certainly no passing "walker".
So what purpose does it serve, then? As usual you appear to contradict seemingly just for the sake of it? More or less every mountain shelter I've seen would take many people hours to build so that is a spurious argument.
The farmer (incidentally a great bloke... and as tough as nails) told me how much he would love to see Dun Borve restored to its former glory - so we aren't talking animal shelter. He lamented the trashed state it is in. Told me how much he wanted me to record what was there, so people would come.
Sorry HD, but through experience I have to agree with Gladders on this one.
Many ancient cairns and stone structures in the wild places have gradually, over the years, been transformed into shelters by walkers and climbers. I've seen these develop with time myself, and many with stones bigger than that, and of a greater height. The key is that the shelter isn't constructed by a single person on one day. It occurs in bits, each time someone, or a group of people arrive in rough weather and need a few minutes of shelter. The original builder digs out a few stones to make a basic shelter in which he can lie. When a group arrives, they pull a few more stones out to increase it. In this way a significant shelter is formed over a year or two.
However, Gladders, I think you are wrong to call these people destructive, and criminals. I think that ignorance of what the structures originally were is the problem. So many of our upland and mountain sites are obscure in terms of awareness and publicity, simply because they are off the tourist track that the coachloads go to, and they don't appear on the postcards. Add to that how hard it is to find any literature about most of these cairns, and it's not hard to see how people are unaware of what thet are doing.
All the best to you both,
TE.