Getting away from it all for charity

Dominic Roskrow reports on two days of walking in Speyside

It has been a strange summer in both Scotland in particular and Britain in general. World politics and events came knocking at our door in a barbed triple whammy in July.

First we had the G8 summit at Gleneagles and the protests and concerts that accompanied them. Then it was announced that London had been granted the Olympic Games, with other parts of Britain including Edinburgh set to stage events.

And finally we were shaken by the arrival of suicide bombers in Western Europe and a summer of disruption and scares.

The G8 summit in particular put the focus of the world on Scotland, particularly after Sir Bob Geldof announced that concerts would be staged around the world to mark the occasion.

The importance of the meeting had long been at the forefront of my mind and at Christmas a group of whisky writers and industry staff had decided to do their bit to highlight world poverty by walking along the Speyside Way to raise money for famine relief and to publicise the Gleneagles event.

It was some undertaking. On the weekend of the Speyside whisky festival we walked a mammoth total of 48 miles in two days and were joined by distillery staff, Scottish parliamentary candidates and supporters. We raised £5,000 ($7,500).

Now I'm no walker and I don't own trekking boots or hill walking equipment so I don't mind admitting that from lunch time on day two there wasn't very much ‘enjoying the scenery' going on.

Indeed, I vividly recall launching in to a rant about how you could...

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• By : Dominic Roskrow
• In : Editor's View
• Issue : 22
• Page : 3
• Words : 523