In 1819, the renowned Scottish ornithologist William MacGillivray walked from Aberdeen, Scotland to London, England in order to visit the natural history collection at the British Museum. If the modern M6 had been available to him, this would be a distance of 548 miles – one way. However because Mr. MacGillivray took a more scenic route that included Ben Nevis, the distance he walked totaled 837 miles; a distance he covered in approximately eight weeks.
All along the way, he kept a meticulous journal of his experiences and observations. It’s a journal well worth the time of any naturalist to read, and thanks to the edition of it title A Walk to London, edited by Dr. Robert Ralph, available from Acair Publishing, there is no excuse for anyone so interested not to do so.
Indeed, I read it in combination with Acair’s more recently published volume of another of Mr. MacGillivray’s peripatetic journals, A Hebridean Naturalist’s Journal 1817-1818, and found both of them to be entertaining, enlightening, and very inspiring indeed. If fact, I’m thinking of reading it – perhaps both of them, again, as encouragement of long walk I’m considering undertaking myself.
Not from Scotland to London, of course – although I’d leap at the chance were it presented to me. No, rather the Country Walking Walk 1,000 Miles 2022. Effectively the distance from Lands End to John O’ Groats, the walk is one participants undertake, a few miles at a time, over the span of a year. As I could do with a focused way to shed the 30 pounds I lost prior to, and then regained following, my knee surgery, I think this might just be the ticket to get me back on my feet. And with edifying passages from Mr. MacGillivray’s journals inspiring me with his adventures and natural history observations during my time doing so, I have high hopes of being able to achieve this goal.
Available from:
