A hundred yards below the summit and fifty yards north of the main run, a few relics of the old tow remain. A four foot length of railway sleeper stands out of the peat: the top of the Yad Moss ?2000? rope tow. Someone should fit a plaque to it;
?Here in 1975 volunteers founded the Yad Moss snow slope opening the way for thousands of skiers and boarders to enjoy their sport in this part of the North Pennines. Our thanks to those pioneers.?
?Yad? is an old Pennine word for pit pony. It may be that this area of rough moorland, or ?Moss?, high above the headwaters of the South Tyne, was used to graze horses from the local lead and coal mines. As you walk up to the ticket office today you still cross the evidence of mining in this area, a series of holes and excavations where a living was scraped from the hillside. There is also, I am told, some evidence that the lead miners themselves used an early form of ski, so perhaps our sport is not quite as new as we sometimes think. Today Yad Moss is one of only four remaining ski areas in northern England equipped with permanent lifts or rope tows. In the early 1980s it was one amongst many.