Lucy Wallace feels all her senses heightened on an emotional return to the hills. Granite has it’s own smell. I think I’ve always known this. I’ve travelled the world and there is always something familiar, intangible and yet homely, in a granitic landscape. Today, in the brisk, dry air, the acrid scent of decaying minerals is distinctive. It’s a sharp, metallic odour, but not unpleasant. I’ve missed it. There are other smells. As soon as we step out of the car, we pick up the earthy flavours of damp soil. We set off through thick birch wood that gives way…

Finding stillness in nature is both immersive and rejuvenating, and can bring nature close to hand. Lucy Wallace is finding solace under lockdown in the sights and sounds of her garden. I’m going to start this piece somewhere very wild and currently out of bounds to me. I’m sitting by the footpath in Glen Feshie, and I can hear my group’s voices echoing in the trees ahead. They’ve stopped for lunch and spirits are high. I’m not sure if they know I’m there, but I can see gangling shapes between the pines, bouncing around in the way that teenage boys…