Walking with the Ramblers

In the UK there is a group of individuals known as the Ramblers. As stated on their website, they are Britain's "walking charity, working to safeguard the footpaths, the countryside and other places we go walking, and to encourage more people to take up walking. With 119,000 members in England, Scotland and Wales, we've been working for walkers for 76 years."


My friend David is a member of the Ramblers, so when we went up to his place in Scotland we took, as they say, 'a bit of a walk'--eight and a half miles to be exact, through the rolling hills of the lower borders of Scotland.  As stated on Wikipedia, the Scottish Borders are located in the Eastern part of the Southern Uplands--see map area marked in red.  The region is hilly and largely rural, with the River Tweed flowing west to east through the region.   In the east of the region the area is known as 'The Merse,' which is where we were walking.

Rights of Way

In Scotland they have something called Scotsway, alternatively referred to as rights of way.  Generally speaking, and particulary since 2003, short of airports, private gardens and a few other places, one is generally allowed to walk about.  Most walks follow known paths, trails, etc.  But generally speaking, even the walk we took, moved through farms and farmland, opening and closing gates to various fields.  It was wonderful and so relaxed.  We would pass farmers and say HI and just keep moving, everything done with respect and class.

Here is a bit of video of the area that I took, about five miles into our 'walk.'  What was incredible to me was the fantastic mixture of farmland and animals we walked by: sheep, cows, flocks of pheasants--something one almost never sees in the states, particularly in Ohio--sheep dogs, deer, buzzards and hawks.

Here is a quick video of some sheep on the hill

Here is me speaking "cow," which i speak quite well.

These cows made me think of one of my favorite cartoons from Gary Larson's The Far Side


The group of Ramblers we walked with over the weekend were all, to put a word to it, in their 'retirements years.'  I was a bit worried about the walk before meeting the group, as I have had a bit of bursitis lately in my hips and was rather tired adjusting to my new habitat; plus, I had just bought the hill shoes I was wearing and so had yet to 'break them in.'  I figured, once I saw my older Rambler group, this should be 'easy peasy.'  You know what I am going to say, in my American vernacular, "Daaymn, but they kicked my *ss!"

My experiences, obviously, are anecdotal, as the UK does have an obesity problem, albeit not to the extent it is in the States.  Nonetheless, the relaxed yet vigorous way of living I encountered in Scotland's countryside, its rolling roads and open pastures, is something I could very easily get used to.  It was, overall, a great day.  As I walked I kept singing that line from Led Zepplin's Stairway to Heaven, "if there's a bustle in your hedgerow, don't be alarmed now; it's just a spring clean for the May queen.  Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run, there's still time to change the road you're on."