I have never heard of a fly mower before, in any case, if you have the muscle a push mower will do. I have one to take care of the areas where a gas mower would not be practical or safe.

I have a push mower for narrow pathways it works fine for me but do not think it would cope with the courser grass types. Hope that helps .

If you're feeling energetic, what about a scythe? They are, supposedly, making a comeback.

Using a scythe on an incline like that? As some say in the USA, that dog don't hunt.

I have a push mower mainly because of small grass area, as good as it is, it will not cute certain types of grass, so instead i just get on my hands and knees and use my shears takes no time at all :)

A scythe would be easier than a push mower on that incline, but I think Catty has the best suggestion - hands and knees :)

do not think it was the slope that James was asking for advice on it was the rough grass at the top of the steps, so a scythe would be ok up there, but I would have thought that a flymo would have done the job just as well without the sweat. lol. anything for an easy life thats me. lol

A petrol driven strimmer would deal with it if you make sure you get one with a thick line rather than the finer trimmer line.

Can you post a photo of what that path looks like? Maybe something can be done that would eliminate the need to let a mower have at it.

I recently bought a Gtech cordless strimmer/edger and find it marvellous for tricky areas. It might be worth looking at. (Their cordless vacuum cleaner, bought 2 months ago, is wonderful and gets full marks from me!)

Or, get a sheep or goat...??? practical for many purposes :D

Well that's very puzzling, if you're saying your Flymo isn't doing the job - in my experience, used with a bit of 'poetic licence' so to speak, they cut anything and everything, although I'll admit there's a knack to it on dodgy areas like this. If yours has a grass box, take it off and use the mower without it.

My thoughts on push along mowers are these - don't waste your time and money, unless you fancy giving up the gym and using a hand mower instead. It certainly won't do for this purpose anyway - they only cut short, well maintained, frequently mown grass and that's certainly not what we're looking at here.

The alternative, as someone else suggested, is a decent strimmer, but you'd have to watch you don't inadvertently damage the base branches of those shrubs.