Karen Thorburn shares her personal perspective on St Kilda – Scotland’s ultima thule. Half my lifetime ago, in 2002, I found myself on holiday with my parents, standing atop huge sand dunes overlooking a magnificent beach on the west coast of the island of Berneray in the Sound of Harris. Pristine golden sand stretched in either direction as far as the eye could see, and turquoise water broke in waves on the shore. The little island of Pabbay lay to the north and, to the west, we looked beyond the Outer Hebrides to a vast expanse of open sea, or…

Although I’m someone who enjoys photographing wildlife, I tend not to head out on walks actively looking for specific creatures in the kinds of places they’re likely to be found. I much prefer the spontaneity, surprise and randomness that any walk can provide, which means that when I do encounter something interesting I’m often caught off guard. I therefore have a growing list of elusive wildlife subjects I’d like to write about in this column, but haven’t felt able to because I wasn’t quick enough or fortunate enough to snap a photo to illustrate them with. Lizards have long been…

I read a blog this week that saddened me, but didn’t unduly surprise me. Iain Cameron regularly contributes to various strands of social media and has made something of a name for himself as Scotland’s snow patch expert. Iain’s contributions to social media are fascinating and his work necessitates long journeys into the Scottish mountains at all times of the year, journeys that often takes him far from the ‘safety’ of footpaths and Munro-bagger’s routes. He has, for a number of years, collated information about Scotland’s snow cover, information that is crucial, for example, in the fight against climate change,…

Modest Ullapool Hill or Meall Mor (270 metres) beckoned on an early August day. I normally just have to open pink OS sheet 15, see the tightly packed contours of deep salmon pink contrasting against the pale spread of broken peninsulas, to be excited towards the pitch of the Coigach and Assynt Hills. Or looking the other way, sheet 20 with its expanse of roadless land, makes me want to pack a rucksack and to twist and turn through that interior that fastens in Beinn Dearg and Seana Bhraigh, and walk right through to the east coast. There is no…

DURING my editorship of The Great Outdoors magazine I had the pleasure of working with the celebrated American mountain photographer Galen Rowell. He had just climbed a Himalayan peak called Cholatse with a good friend of mine, the English mountain guide Bill O’Connor, and we planned a photographic feature on the expedition. I had come to know Galen through Bill – the mountaineering world is full of such personal connections – and I corresponded with him for some years. During that time I published three or four of Galen’s illustrated articles in TGO. At the time Galen Rowell was making…

Walkhighlands, or bikehighlands? This time it’s a temporary two wheeled takeover, as David Lintern and family take to their steeds to reach the parts that little legs can’t quite manage. Getting a young family out and about is harder than it should be. Mum is bone tired and the kids (aged 4 and 1) aren’t independently mobile as yet. Before the really cold weather came in last year, we enjoyed one wild camp, but carrying the volume of stuff needed for four means that moving from place to place becomes next to impossible without tantrums… and that’s just the adults.…