Getting to the Start of It

The thing to remember about the Watershed of Scotland, is that it is entirely Nature Made. Formed ever so slowly, in geo-glacial time, as the very shape of Scotland somehow emerged from beneath the ice-sheets and our very shores were cooried oot by the fall and rise of sea levels: the land-form discovered a watershed. Not quite an east : west divide, but one, as we have now defined, which is more about where all that rain water ends up - in Ocean or Sea. I say all this, not so much by way of a geography lesson, but to presage a wee inconvenience in actually getting to its` southern terminus at Peel Fell on the England : Scotland Border - for the start of the anticipated journey. Its a quite out of the way sort of place, in which public transport would be of little benefit. So a car driven by someone else and returning to base, is the only practical way.

Having accepted that inevitability, the journey south from home in Linlithgow, once past the Pentland Hills is a delightful one, through the rolling landscapes of the Scottish Borders. The ancient Burghs of Melrose, Selkirk and Hawick mark-out the passing territories, and once the the hills of the Watershed are crossed, the road drops down through the sitka forests into Liddesdale. Kielder village beckons after an unassuming Border crossing near a farmhouse; destination for the night.

Now we must pause to consider that this route that`s going to be followed over the ensuing twenty three days, is sadly not going to be for real. We should perhaps call it a virtual route, or the `V.Route`,  because the Covid-19 restrictions have put-paid to it being any kind of real journey, or experience. 

So as I sit with all my kit, well metaphorically at least, in Kielder, a 1950s Forestry Commission village in the lee of the grandly named Kielder Castle hunting lodge, it is only now that I`m able to indulge in a feeling of real anticipation of what lies ahead. So allow that feeling linger, and let our collective imaginations switch to this virtual experience that is described in these pages, and all the days ahead. For I feel bound to share all that I know of the landscapes that would have been traveled so purposefully.