Birnam Hill Wild Walks

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Can I introduce you to some old friends of mine?

This is Peter Rabbit, Flopsy, Mopsy and Cottontail.

Of course, they are the heroes of the Beatrix Potter children's books,

Tales of Peter Rabbit.

And while the Lake District in Cumbria would lay claim to ownership of Beatrix Potter,

it was actually here in the village of Birnam where the young Beatrix

used to come for long summer holidays,

that she became interested in rabbits and the natural world.

And, indeed, wrote her first picture letter, if you like,

with the stories of Peter Rabbit.

And not very far away from here, along the River Tay at Dalguise,

she became friends with the washerwoman, a Mrs Kitty MacDonald.

She was later fictionalised as Mrs Tiggy-Winkle.

I've come here this morning to climb a wee hill

that's become a real favourite of mine over the years.

Birnam Hill is only 1,300 feet in height,

but it is a great walk nevertheless.

And not only does it have associations with Beatrix Potter,

but many of you will recognise it from Shakespeare's Macbeth.

Look at that! You'd think somebody had just

unzipped the outer bark and it's all sort of flowing out.

And when you see things like that, you realise how

the young Beatrix Potter's imagination

was stimulated by sights like this one.

For my sins, I have to travel between Badenoch in the Highlands

and Glasgow two or three times a week. Quite often,

in the summer particularly, I like to drive off the A9,

park in Birnam and just climb Birnam Hill.

It's a lovely leg stretch for the long, balmy nights of summer.

Even here in the middle of winter, when the high tops,

like today, are stormy-bound, it's a great wee hill.

Great views both to the north and to the flatter lands of the south.

But there's something else too about this hill, particularly these woods,

there is a very real atmosphere of antiquity.

I sometimes wonder whether it's that same atmosphere

that inspired William Shakespeare when he passed through here in 1601.

Terrific view from here!

The trees all along the east side of Birnam Hill

are on the site of the ancient Birnam Woods,

the subject of the witches' prophecy in Macbeth.

"Great Birnam Wood to high Dunsinane

"Shall come against him."

And down below me here,

I reckon was possibly the site of the last camp of Malcolm,

son of Duncan, and Macduff, the Thane of Fife,

before they set out to high Dunsinane and the historical defeat of Macbeth.

And, by my reckoning, Dunsinane Hill

is away on the horizon in the Sidlaw Hills, just north of Dundee.

It's always good to get above the trees, to get this side of the forest,

where you begin to get some of the views opening up,

a bit of expansiveness. You can see right across the floodplain

of the River Tay away across to the hills over yonder.

It is just absolutely superb, you get this sort of spaciousness,

even on a wee hill walk like this one, it's absolutely terrific.

It's hard work in the snow!

But when you come up to this little final bit,

up a wee gulley that takes you on to the summit plateau,

there is something like 160 wooden steps to help you up there.

I'm never very sure if wooden steps help you or deter you!

Anyway, they're mostly covered in snow today, so it doesn't really matter.

Well, this is the summit of Birnam Hill,

mapped on the map as King's Seat.

I'm not sure what King it's referring to,

whether it's King Duncan, King Malcolm, or maybe Macbeth himself.

The remarkable thing is people drive right past this hill

and Edinburgh is just over an hour away,

Glasgow is just over an hour away, Dundee is less than an hour away,

these great centres of population. And it's remarkable too

that it's right in the line of the geological faultline that runs across Scotland

from the south end of Loch Lomond up to Stonehaven.

And if you look right along this line,

you can see the mosaic of fields and forests,

and then the sudden swell of the Highlands as it becomes the Highland hills.

So, it's a great wee walk.

It doesn't matter if you're into Beatrix Potter or not,

or William Shakespeare or not, it's still a grand walk.

And, I have to confess, I prefer Rabbie Burns...