Hay's Way: Watch how walking around Scotland has been for the first two months

Watch Hay's Way: My walking tour around Scotland trip on Shots! right here.

Arriving on Langholm Moor in Dumfries and Galloway, surrounded by feral goats, it seemed like a good place to do a round up of how Hay’s Way is going. I am feeling a bit feral myself.

It’s been two months since I set off from Mar Lodge in the Cairngorms, Aberdeenshire, in March.

I walked east, down the coast and into Angus before crossing the Tay Bridge into Fife and walked along the coast. I then zig-zagged my way through East Lothian and the Scottish Borders, seeing the entire east coastline of both regions, but also heading inland on several occasions.

Some feral goats on Langholm Moor.

In the last couple of weeks I have walked through multiple Borders towns including Melrose, Selkirk and Hawick before arriving at Langholm, my first stop in Dumfries and Galloway, and the sixth council area (out of 32 in Scotland) on this trip.

I have split my accommodation between my tent, budget hotels or hostels and contacts who have had me to stay. On a few occasions, total strangers have let me crash on their sofa, spare room or in a garden shed. Scotland has really been opening its doors to me.

In some cases I have planned meetings in advance, but the majority of the walk has turned out to be just seeing where the country and its people take me; hearing what matters to the communities in the areas I am visiting.

I don’t think I would have met the eclectic bunch I have so far if it was any other way.

After ducking into the Crown Hotel in Langholm High Street for a rest and a pint, I asked some of the locals at the bar what the history was behind the feral goats.

One of them replied: ‘Which ones? The ones on the hill or the ones in here?’

More to follow on Hay’s Way.