Cameron McNeish admits to having been hugely inspired by Sir Chris Bonington’s early failures, rather than his successes. IT was a long time ago and I was lurching between jobs, unsure of my future and dreading the thought of suffering some corporate nine-to-five regime for the next 40 years. The only things I really wanted to do were to climb mountains and explore wild places and at that relatively youthful stage in my life I couldn’t think of a career that would enable me to do that. At 24 I was married with a young son and I didn’t have…

Following on from last month’s article, David Lintern seeks a further audience with she who must be obeyed – the Cailleach. The Cailleach, the Scottish spirit-feminine of wild nature, sometimes benevolent and sometimes malevolent, is an integral part of our placename culture. The mother of autumn stormy chaos, sister of frigid winter snows and daughter of regenerating spring bubbles up from our primeval consciousness everywhere we look – in coires, lochs, burns, moors and summits right across the country. On the Isle of Lewis, a whole moonlit panorama is named after her. Viewed from the standing stones of Callanish, the…

It was hard not to feel impossibly smug as I propped my bike up against the ruined house at Gortenbuie. It was absolutely calm, not a breath of wind, and as I peered through the empty windows the only sound I could hear was the rigid dried-up leaves falling from the adjacent sycamore tree. As expected, I’d seen no-one. “How many people ever access the hill from this direction?” I wondered. I stepped out of the ruin’s shadow and looked to the south. The undulating skyline of Mull’s interior burned rusty red in the rising sun, the high hills scattering…