Our "That's Me" interview series continues with Alan Ratliff, the climbing cabbie who took up walking and climbing late in life.

In a climbing world that seems increasingly centred around youth, with the top performers getting younger, the fashions getting more ‘street’ and the ropes getting thinner, it’s easy to forget that climbing is a sport for children of all ages. Alan Ratliff is one of an uncommon breed. Following the death of his wife from cancer, he started hill walking at the age of 61. Soon after, he moved to rock climbing, and in the intervening thirteen years, has travelled and climbed across the world.

Born in North London, Alan’s life has included that forgotten episode that is National Service, serving in Hong Kong, China and Vienna. Following that, he spent time building up his own business as a chauffeur. In a bid for more control over his work life, he became a cabbie 30 years ago, and has been doing it ever since. Now approaching 75, Alan is as keen on life as ever.

When your partner dies, it tears a terrible hole in your life.
Susan and I lived in each others’ pockets, and my family was all I needed. After someone goes, you don’t want to forget them, but you can’t spend all your time dwelling on your situation, or you could go down a hole.

A cabbie friend dragged me away for a weekend’s walking in The Lakes.
I loved it. After that I had a week’s holiday, so I signed up for an Introductory Rock course at Plas y Brenin in North Wales. It was fantastic, I didn’t look back.

I’m never going to do the hardest climbs.
But that’s not the point. I’m fit and healthy, and climbing has taken me to some amazing places.

The best thing about being a taxi driver is the freedom.
I’ve been in the trade for 30 years. Before that I was a limousine chauffeur, but then it always seemed that you had to be somewhere, weddings usually, doing what somebody else tells you. As a cabbie, nobody tells you what to do. It’s probably as close as you can get to being master of your own destiny. And at my age, that’s become very important.

I’ve picked up a few famous people.
The last one was Alec Guinness. I shouldn’t have told him, but I said he’d put on weight. I loved his early films, like The Man in the White Suit, and asked him what it was like working on the River Kwai. He said, “Bloody hot!”

There’s a wall in our works canteen, covered in pictures of people who’ve died on the job.
It makes you think. Some blokes there half my age can hardly walk across the floor without getting out of breath. I eat well, I take lots of exercise. One day I was stuck in traffic in my cab, and I realised I was curling my toes from stress. You’ve got to relax.

The Freemasons is not a secret society, it’s a society with secrets.
A certain handshake, something secret you might say. After my wife died, a friend of mine reckoned I was becoming a recluse, so he took me along to the masons. I became quite involved in it, and rose to the rank of Worshipful Master.

I’m a yellow belt in aikido.
I took it up two years ago, but if I buck my ideas up I should make it to orange soon.

You lose a great part of yourself if you don’t trust people.
In life, I’ve always tried to do the decent thing, I believe things are reciprocal. You get a lot of people in this trade who swear that you should never trust anyone, but I’ve only been knocked (had a fare run away) three times in 30 years of cab driving. And that isn’t bad.

My bones don’t heal like they used to.
I’ve had two bad falls so far; once on Lundy and once at Stanage. As a result some foot placements have become harder. I might stick to sport climbing from now on.

I owe most of my climbing to Thames Valley Climbing Club.
I’ve been with them ever since I started, travelling all over the country and further afield. When you’re new to the sport, finding the right club can really make a difference.

My best climbing experience has been the Devil’s Slide on Lundy.
I’ve been to Lundy three times with the club now, and the Devil’s Slide is just outstanding. It’s an enormous sweep of lovely granite, with very few runners; I get a real buzz from doing routes like that.

They had a taxi race here in London.
A cabbie with ‘the knowledge’ versus a Licensed Private Hire Vehicle using satnav. The cabbie won - of course.

I’d love to climb The Old Man of Hoy.
Wow. What a thing. I’m still climbing all right, and I think I could do it.  I’m still improving, although I know there’ll come a time when I will reach the plateau. But that’s okay; it’s good to know your limitations.

At 18 you think you know everything. At 70, you’ve seen a lot of life go by.
My dad used to say, “There’s no fool like an old fool,” and I finally think I understand what he meant.

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