What a day! Today is a milestone day: my longest walk since I was a Girl Guide in the 1960s; we have crossed the border into Scotland; we have completed two thirds of our long walk – and we are both totally exhausted!

We set off early and it took us an hour to climb/scramble up the hill from Byrness through the forest and onto the moors. We finally said goodbye to the Pennine Way and turned onto Dere Street, a Roman Road, and into Scotland. Although the ‘road’ was not easy to follow initially, it was pretty straight. We ploughed through boggy undergrowth, followed the path alongside walls on farmland, walked on tarmac surfaces and then narrow paths. All this on undulating hills, before we finally descended into Jedburgh, grateful to arrive at our accommodation for the night.

A Backward Glance

Woke up this morning in a bit of a panic when I realised we were entering Scotland and neither of us knew a word of Scottish. I worked with a friend and colleague from Glasgow for over twenty years and in all that time never understood a word he said. He’d say, “Yer Bums oot the windae so haud yer wheesht ye dobber”. I’d just nod pretending to understand and reply, “Och aye Jimmy”, and he’d smile thinking I did. We did a short but steep ascent to the top of Byrness Hill and continued along the Pennine Way; pleasant walking, occasionally soft underfoot but with glorious views all around. The border crossing for us was a rotten wooden gate in a wire fence, so I opened the gate and the yett closed behind us; we were in! The way quickly became impossible to find, but we saw Greg and Victoria who are also LEJOGers striding purposefully behind us. After minimum pleasantries, they pushed on ahead, but it wasn’t long before Carol decided their route was dodgy, so took another way. Soon they were behind us again, keeping about a quarter of a mile distant and watching every move we made. I felt so proud of my expert explorer with her backwoods tracking skills. To annoy them we stopped at a gate to let them pass, which they reluctantly did, but unfortunately the path soon became a lot clearer and again they accelerated out of view. After some time crossing hills of open grassland the way became quiet tarmac roads winding up over interminable hills. We’d drunk all the water we had and when eventually reaching Spread Eagle Inn, after asking for two pints of O&L, were only given two tiny glasses – we didn’t get off to a great start! But nothing could quench the good feelings of having made it into Bonnie Scotland.