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Heading up the path from Durisdeer to the wild Lowther Hills

Did you know?

The hamlet of Durisdeer, from where this walk starts, is something of a film star, as it appears in 1978 version of the British thriller The Thirty-Nine Steps. The little white cottage here stands in as the village post office in Strathallan.

I couldn’t imagine what it might be like being a child in a bothy, being able to sleep out in a stone shelter in the middle of nowhere, being allowed to stay up late by a fire blazing, drinking a cup of hot chocolate in my pyjamas. So I don’t know how a little girl called Ellie felt when her mother brought her to Kettleton Byre, one summer in 2014, and they spent two nights curled up in their momentary home shut away from the rest of the world, far from TVs and mobile phones.

Always be sure to look for the bothy book when you arrive

After reading about their adventure in the bothy book, high above the farming land, I went outside to sit on the little bench. Under the stars I listened to the sounds – a distant ’baa’ from a sheep, the swoop of a bat overhead, the ’go-back’ call of the grouse among the long tufts of grass. Up here my phone had no reception, I couldn’t speak to anyone, couldn’t check my email or go on Twitter to share my story. I was removed from all the distractions we thrust at ourselves to block out the time we spend alone.