IT began as a minor irritant at the end of a great day on Bidean nam Bian. It was the beginning of summer as I wandered down through Coire an Lochan and became aware of an irritating pain on the inside of my knee. Within a couple of days the pain had reduced to a dull ache. A couple of weeks later I was filming with the BBC on the Isle of Arran. As part of the programme we climbed Goat Fell and such is the nature of filming that we took our time, stopping every so often to position…
A number of years ago I made a television programme with the late Chris Brasher. The idea was that we’d take a multi-day walk in the Cairngorms and discuss how wild landscapes had affected his life, an extraordinary life as an athlete, Olympic gold medallist and an enthusiastic mountaineer and hillwalker. Shortly after he arrived in Aviemore Chris asked if we minded if he disappeared for a day during the week. He had a horse running at Punchestown races near Dublin and he wanted to go and see it. As you can imagine this posed considerable problems for our filming…
AT the end of September one of Scotland’s best known environmental campaigners will retire from his post as director of Ramblers Scotland. To be honest I’m not terribly sure if that is his title anymore. A few years ago, in a fit of Londoncentricism and not a little pique, the Ramblers CEO at the time, one Tom Franklin, decimated the Ramblers Scottish and Welsh offices in a so-called cost-cutting operation. The Scottish budget was drastically reduced and Ramblers Scotland office personnel was cut from seven to one and a half and the director’s salary halved. I have absolutely no doubt…
IT’S one of Scotland’s finest glens, the gateway to some of the best hills in the Central Highlands and a place that was close to the heart of a Celtic princess. Glen Etive has been one of my favourite Scottish glens, ever since I discovered the story of Deirdre of the Sorrows, a first century Pictish princess who was betrothed to the High King of Ulster before fleeing to Scotland and Etive-side with her lover, Naoise, one of the Three Sons of Uisneach. Celtic tales tell of her love of these hills, and of her heartbreak at having to leave…
THIS recognition of Scotland’s wild land as a nationally important asset that needs to be safeguarded marks a historic breakthrough. Scotland’s landscapes are spectacular, contributing to our quality of life, our national identity and the visitor economy. The John Muir Trust has fought long and hard over many years with the support of many thousands of people to achieve official recognition for wild land and we welcome this commitment. I would endorse these sentiments, made by Stuart Brooks of the John Muir Trust in response to the Scottish Government’s recent announcement of further protection for Scotland’s wild land. Other NGO’s…
Apologies to those who have read the following story before but it does illustrate how times and attitudes have changed in Scotland. Back in the late seventies I was invited to attend a press conference in Glasgow to launch a guidebook to the West Highland Way. The route hadn’t been officially opened but the publishers Constable had produced a guidebook, written by a chap called Tom Hunter. The publishers also brought John Hillaby with them. Hillaby was a science writer-cum-long-distance-walker who had written Journey Through Britain, an excellent account of walking between Land’s End and John O’Groats, even though it…
I'VE often wondered what it is that makes us so excited and thrilled to see wild animals or birds of prey in their own environment. A few years ago I made a television programme about a long walk on the Isle of Skye and we camped for our first night at Rubha Hunish, at the northern tip of the Trotternish peninsula. Before settling down for the night we had been watching minke whales surfacing just a couple of hundred metres offshore. We were thrilled, a hard-bitten, seen-it-all television crew, five grown men all experienced in the ways and sights of…
I have the 18th September marked off in my diary. A reminder to go and vote, not that I'll need any reminder. I want to mark off the 19th as well, to take a day off and, hopefully, enjoy the biggest party Scotland has seen for 300 years. But then it might be the most depressing day ever, depending on your view. It could be a day for escaping to the hills. I’m all too aware that for many hill-goers politics and the hills don’t mix. I respect that view. For most of us the hills represent a release from…
WE don't have many good environmental columnists in Scotland but I would suggest Rob Edwards of The Sunday Herald is probably the best. Rob recently picked up a story about a letter that had been sent to The Scottish Farmer newspaper, a letter that encouraged an official of the Scottish Gamekeepers’ Association to make an outrageous statement on Facebook, a statement that could be interpreted as expressing an attitude amongst gamekeepers that many of us hoped had died out years ago. I’ve always enjoyed a reasonable rapport with the gamekeeping fraternity in Scotland. Certainly there have been various individuals who…
DO you know what ‘Am Monadh Ruadh’ translates as? Yes, indeed, it means the red rounded hills, the name that the area we now know as the Cairngorms was historically called. And yet, Cairn Gorm means something different. The literal translation of Cairn Gorm is ‘blue pile of stones’, so why does the Cairngorms National Park Authority have Am Monadh Ruadh and Cairngorms on their letterheads and notice boards? Before we look at that it’s perhaps a good idea to look at the use of Gaelic names, especially in the context of our hills and mountains and highland place names,…