Chasing My Twenty-Year Legacy

There`s a real pleasure to be had in having come up with something original and definitive. Certain national authorities on the subject confirmed the assertion, so I`ll gladly take their word for it.

It all kicked off twenty years ago this January, when I set off from the summit of a hill called Peel Fell, almost on the Border between England and Scotland. Ahead of me on my great epic solo hike was 1,200 kilometres of bog, rock, mountain, moor and forest, but I was some 20 years younger then, of course. The chosen route for this roller coaster of a meander was the Watershed of Scotland; that intriguing geographic feature which determines where rainwater falling on Scotland will end up. With only two possible destinations, the North Sea to the East on the one hand, or the wider body of the Atlantic Ocean on all other coasts. Not too much room for debate on what it's all about; a simple concept.

Planning for this great venture had started over eighteen months earlier, and the first task was to plot the route with some geographic discipline and rigour. I most certainly did not want to suddenly find I`d made a mistake somewhere along the way. There had also been a bit of a dispute, or discussion at least, about some key aspects of the Watershed, not least, its northern terminus. However, having defined the North Sea and Atlantic destinations as critically important to this, it all fell into place; a definitive Watershed of Scotland was drawn on the map. I later discovered that there were only two previous publicly available, though obscure, statements on any of this, but neither set out the whole story as it had emerged from geo-glacial time.

It was somewhat surprising then that a personage who had left school at the age of fourteen would be the one to very publicly plot and critically, define such a key geographic feature in entirety upon the landscapes of Scotland end-to-end.

Plotting and planning, sorting out the logistics and timings, all form such an important, and as I found, intriguing part of the whole venture. That great sense of anticipation mingled with just a little bit of nervousness, gave it all a nice tingle. There were so few other points of reference to call up. Off into the unknown then, armed with all that preparation.

The details of the sixty-four-day journey, challenges, discoveries, people, weather and all the rest are not being revisited here, because it`s all set out in the Ribbon of Wildness trilogy I subsequently wrote and published by Luath Press. From where I am now, it’s a twenty-year journey, and that is cause for celebration. Along the way, this has inspired several other intrepid adventurers to don their boots or running shoes – yes, I did say running! It's been a pleasure and an honour to meet with most, to share advice and experiences, and to provide support when called for. Every one of them has put their particular stamp on how they tackled their own Watershed of Scotland venture. Most have expressed this in print, in their very personal ways. Photographs have been shared, interviews have been greatly appreciated, and all have contributed to creating a wider public awareness of a large slice of Scotland`s wild meanderings end-to-end.

The women and men who have become what might now be called Watershedists, have covered a wide age spectrum, and both running and walking are now in the canon of experience played out along those one thousand twelve hundred kilometres.

So is there anything to be regretted in this personal twenty-year journey? A fair question, I must acknowledge. Anything unfulfilled?

The answer to this searching question is, yes.

When I tackled the hike all those years ago, I was blown away by the whole experience, and by the discovery of largely continuous wildness throughout. Wildness is a relative word of course, but in this context, it encapsulates the character of landscape on and about the Watershed, compared to that which lay beyond and below. So when I set out to write Ribbon of Wildness – Discovering the Watershed of Scotland, there was a clear need to demonstrate, to prove, that there was substance to this description. That it wasn’t just the fantasising of a long-distance solo walker.

So months of research followed. I called up all manner of national, international and local landscape designations and protections, delved into things geological, agricultural, ecological, and from this, categorised almost every one of those roller coasteering twelve hundred kilometres. I used a bit of good geographic rigour in the definition of the Watershed and even plotted it northwards through Orkney and Shetland, with the benefits of sea charts. I asked, what did Scotland`s landform look like as we emerged from the last Ice Age, to nail my arguments.  I truly did justice to the description of Ribbon of Wildness, even identifying those locations in which the ribbon was a bit threadbare. A very honest appraisal.

Large numbers of people have commented on how much they like this approach to the adventuring landscapes and loved the social history and literary references I wove into the narrative. So why the regrets?

I`d built what I believed to be a sound case showing that Scotland is bound together with that precious thing called wildness, end-to-end. But not one of the national environmental agencies has felt inclined to pick up on this and take it further; make something of it. Yes, a lost opportunity I do believe. One of the reasons for this is perhaps, that almost every form of landscape designation, whether for ecology, habitat, geology or even wild land, is relative to that specific site`s characteristics. So no joined-up thinking is to be had. Even the Heritage Lottery Fund threw it out, twice. The concept of community of interest carried no weight.

So have I failed then? Not really, because my argument and all I assembled to support it, is still there in print for all time; I've made the case. And that I, that very non-academic sort of person, should have done so, is a nice outcome. The opportunity is still there.

In the meantime, more intrepid Watershedists will come along, inspired by this great journey in their minds. They`ll leave no mark in the landscapes they experience, but it will most surely enrich their lives, reward their efforts many times over, and touch their hearts.

A fine twenty-year legacy.