I walk the Tweed regularly with my border collies between the Tweed Bridge at Manor and the Barns estate. Have done so for the last 30+ years. So many happy times spent there walking in all seasons watching the spring birds arrive, seeing kingfishers and otters and other wildlife. I especially love the arrival of […]

In 2004 I was employed by an arts in education initiative running projects with students to encourage storytelling through filmmaking and photography. Canoes and Cameras is part of an early project with year 6 pupils from Ashington schools. Their first time in canoes and first time using a video camera. You can watch our experience […]

Travelling through Tweedsmuir, you’ll find an old inn at a bend in the road where hills, travellers, and stories have met for centuries. It’s called The Crook Inn, and one of its most memorable characters was a woman known as Jeanie O’ the Crook. Jeanie Hutchison was born at the inn in 1807, daughter of […]

Strawberry Hill rises quietly above Tweedsmuir, its 495-metre summit offering wide, rewarding views after a strenuous climb. From the top, the waters of Fruid Reservoir stretch out below, with nearby Garelet Dod standing watch across the valley. It is a place where landscape and history meet, and where the name of the hill carries a […]

Rising quietly to just 538 metres, the hill was hardly impressive at first glance. Sheep grazed its slopes, and mist often clung to its rounded summit, disguising it as little more than another fold in the Scottish Borders. Yet locals had always called it The Crown of Scotland, a name far grander than the hill […]

The house and estate of Makerstoun was home of the Makdougall family for many years. In 1860, following the death of Sir Thomas Brisbane, it was inherited by Maria Scott Makdougall, a spinster, 76 years of age. Miss Makdougall was a staunch teetotaler who now found herself in possession of one of the finest wine […]