Media release: Elite mountain bike racer, Mikayla Parton, wins Youth Mountain Award
The festival’s youth ambassador award, established in 2015, celebrates adventurous young people, the landscapes they choose to explore and the outdoor pursuits in which they excel.
The young winner needs to have shown resilience and determination to succeed within their chosen area of expertise, shown results through their own efforts and ideas, given back to their community, whilst being thought of as an example of excellence by others.
Mikayla Parton epitomises these winning principles perfectly. Her meteoric rise to the top of the international downhill mountain bike race scene, from riding her first trail bike in 2015 to placing fifth at the UCI Mountain Bike World Championships 2020, in just five years can be attributed to an obvious raw talent, constant hard work, dedicated training, motivation, focus and a dogged determination for success.
Time: 4 hours THE Pass of Drumochter separates the rounded hills of Carn na Caim and A’ Bhuidheanach Bheag from the more distinctive mountains of the Druim Uachdair, the ridge of the upper ground. Gathered nicely together in one corner of this area, the four Munros of Geal-Charn, A’ Mharconaich, Beinn Udlamain and Sgairneach Mhor make a good expedition and give some of the best views possible of the Ben Alder hills across the long trench of Loch Ericht, particularly from Geal-charn. In the short days of winter a curtailed round of Geal-Charn and A’ Mharconaich offers a satisfying day out and has the advantage of starting at just over 400 metres at Balsporran Cottages, just off the A9.
Kenny MacAskill discusses the Scottish land reform struggle
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Pedal Power Why e-bikes might be your new favourite exercise
Grab your camera and get snapping to enter our annual Photographer of the Year competition
Scotland’s Islands The Hawaii of the north,
Tiree is a Scottish paradise
The Great Gear Guide, Around Scotland events,
and reviews of the best hotels and restaurants
will keep you right this month.
FORMER Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill has launched an attack on the sacking of Joanna Cherry from the SNP s frontbench at Westminster amid an angry backlash against the decision. The East Lothian MP hit out strongly over Cherry s removal from her post as the party s home affairs and justice spokeswoman in the Commons and said the development would damage the independence fight. I know how highly rated Joanna Cherry is in UK justice circles as well the party grassroots in Scotland. She remains head and shoulders above most others and I for one stand by her. This is the leadership s call but many of us find this inexplicable and harmful to our cause, he wrote on Twitter this afternoon.
Distance: 9 miles/14km
Time: 5-7 hours IT’S ironic that within a couple of miles of one of Scotland’s finest mountain footpaths lies one of the worst. The good path runs up the steep, airy edge of Gleouraich’s south-west ridge above Loch Quoich near Glengarry, a superb stalkers’ path that has been well maintained by the estate. But close by, at the eastern end of Loch Quoich, just south of its dam, another path leads to the Druim na Geid Salaich, a long, rising ridge that in turn gives access to the Munro of Gairich. The boggy, rutted, poorly drained and badly eroded nature of this path shouldn’t really surprise anyone for this is a land notorious for its high rainfall. The area around Loch Quoich, just west of Glen Garry, has the distinction of being one of the wettest places in Scotland.