Live Life Team
Mountain Bothies Association (MBA) is an aid organisation which maintains about 100 open shelters for walkers and hikers in various distant areas of the United Kingdom. Most MBA bothies are sheltered in Scotland, but some are in North England and Wales. MBA provides these bothies for those people who love to wander in distant places and value the great outdoors. MBA does not own any of the bothies it maintains; these belong to the landowners who permit them to manage it.
The MBA’s development exceeded the management capability of its original committee. Neal Parrish, a manager at the Pulp Mill in Fort William, filled in the vacant chairman’s post. He is a skilled walker and bothy user, and his knowledge in management brought the organisation to success. Colin Scales served for a period of 24 years as treasurer of the MBA, and the existing healthy and stable financial position of the MBA is credited to him. There were inspiring achievements of the MBA along with the efforts of the administrative team, including regenerated confidence in the MBA through the continued increase in membership numbers and an increase in grants and charitable funding from external sources. After 35 years, the MBA team in the southern Scotland area is engaged in reconstructing its bothy from its original structure.
Hill walking and mountaineering rose in popularity as a form of recreation for all of society. As the numbers of hill walkers and mountaineers rose, the MBA also expanded its bothies to provide them with a shelter away from home.
