Still wild
Bushcraft expert Ray Mears on how the
35 years in the wilderness, Ray Mears has not only survived but thrived. And the TV presenter and survival expert says Scotland has been at the heart of his career teaching bushcraft.
“I love Scotland, it’s my spiritual second home,” said Ray, 54. “There’s something in the air and it’s just so beautiful. The air is clean, the water’s clean and the people are fantastic.
“It’s an amazing place and when you are there you feel very much alive. The wind blows away a lot of the troubles of the world.
“Watching an eagle soaring over the mountains or an osprey falling on a fish is magical. “You have to cope with the weather or rejoice in it when it’s wonderful.
“Sadly, like the rest of the world, the politicians are messing everything up.
“Politics has become so complicated and people seem to want to cause problems rather than sort things out.
“There’s no rest in politics at the moment and I find that very upsetting.
“People have forgotten how beautiful the world around them is and squabble over petty issues.”
Ray has presented a host of programmes from all around the world, most recently Australian Wilderness for ITV. But he spends at least a month of every year with friends here, as well as the time running his courses.
Ray started Woodlore, Britain’s first school of wilderness bushcraft, in 1983 and plans have just been announced for him to personally lead a series of courses next year.
Two in particular, the Fundamental Lochside and the Journeyman, will be north of the border and our climate and countryside provide a whole different level of challenge for participants.
“We started courses in Perthshire back in the 1990s and we moved our advanced course, the Journeyman, to Scotland. “That was because it was so much more rugged as well as being a different habitat.
“And the weather itself is tougher, which I like. It’s nice that after people have done their basic training in England, where it’s warmer and they have more resources with plants and trees, to then go to Scotland to test themselves more.”
Although he has travelled to most corners of the world for his popular TV shows, some of his favourite memories are of his times in Scotland.
“I remember coming through the Lairig Ghru one winter in deep snow.
“I came across tracks of Scottish wildcats on the south side. It was really special but when I told a local wildlife expert he said there were no wildcats up there.
“Five years later he sent me a letter saying they actually had found some there. I thought it was lovely that he’d remembered to come back to me and say they had found them.” Ray’s enthusiasm was fired at primary school when he started tracking foxes and wanted to camp out to watch them.
His parents had no camping equipment but his judo teacher told him he didn’t need any, you could find whatever you needed to survive all around you.
“It turned out he had fought behind the lines in Burma during the Second World War,” explained Ray. “That’s what opened the door for me. “The key thing he taught me was how a few little things had helped him so much. He was in the desert in North Africa for a
It’s an amazing place and when you are there you feel very much alive. The wind blows away a lot of the troubles of the world. Watching an eagle soaring over the mountains or an osprey falling on a fish is magical