I can’t imagine many people come to ride the Golspie Wildcat trailhead just in passing. Bringing a bike to this side of the Highlands requires you to carry on past a number of tempting left turns into mighty mountains.
The birch tree was one of the earliest colonists after the last Ice Age, so has been in Scotland for a very long time.
The main trunk road to the northwest, the West Highland Railway and the West Highland Way all pass very close to Beinn Dorain, so the hill’s well known to many.
I went for a walk in the woods in the first week of the year. Down by the quiet place where I park my car there is, improbably, a scattering of giant sequoias, the spellbinding, sky-tending redwoods of the High Sierra of the Californian West.
Good path work in recent years has meant that what was often a bog fest followed by an ungainly clamber up a scree is now a much more pleasant walk from the Glen Clova Hotel to Loch Brandy and up on to the promontory known as The Snub.
What started as a one-off event for a TV show has become one of the world’s most iconic races.
It’s one thing if it rains while you’re camping – it’s cosy, almost. It’s quite another when it pours while you’re setting up.
At 1,108m (3,635ft) Meall a’ Bhuiridh is the highest summit in a fine set of hills known as the Blackmount.
A spectacular portion of Scotland’s west coast stretches from Oban to Fort William.
I am heading south through the Sma’Glen on my way to Argaty, near Doune, a 1,300-acre estate owned by the Bowser family, who run the Red Kite Centre.
Any plans for New Year? If you have, I suppose that – following convention and the calendar – you’ll put them into practice on December 31.