by Alan Rowan.

I was always going to like this book – 238 pages about night-hiking in the Scottish mountains.

This book chronicles the author’s round of the Munros, the 287 Scottish mountains higher than 3,000′. As such it could have been a dull read, but accompanying the catalogue of hill names, routes, and height gains and losses are the comfortingly familiar tales of being frozen, drenched, exhausted, lost, wind-beaten, and spooked that will bring a nostalgic cheer to any climber of Scotland’s hills. Alan Rowan particularly speaks to my condition when he talks of watching the sun come up from 3,000′ and that smug feeling of passing early birds heading out just as you’re getting back to the car.

There are many other anecdotes, including those detailing Rowan’s very many overnight hikes, and I liked the chapter-heading line drawings too (particularly the ones of the dog).

Laugh-out-loud funny in many places, I loved this book, and I believe it would appeal to any mountaineer and/or anyone with a love of the Scottish wilderness.