367 Holly Worton ~ Finding Yourself Through Solo Travel and Outdoor Adventures

Transcript

Holly: Hello and welcome to the Into the Woods podcast, episode 368. This is your host Holly Worton and I have got a very exciting guest today, Yvette Webster, who is one of my favourite bloggers and she is also my blogging coach. Yvette is based in Scotland but she is originally from New Zealand and she writes all kinds of fun and exciting things about hiking and camping and backpacking in Scotland.

So,Yvette Webster is a full-time travel blogger at Wayfaring Kiwi and Kiwi & Haggis and lover of nature and the outdoors. She was the first solo female to hike the Scottish National Trail, an 864 kilometre trail that runs the length of Scotland, beginning in the south, on the border with England, and ending at Cape Wrath. She is currently writing a book about her hike and I cannot wait to read it!

We talk in this episode about how to take your hiking to the next level and this is something that I am personally interested in because I am looking at kind of upping my game with my backpacking and my hiking and my long-distance trails and I want to know how to do it safely and I think I am not the only one with this question, I think a lot of people are always looking to challenge themselves a little bit more with their outdoor activities in a safe way.

So we talk about: Yvette’s experience hiking the Scottish National Trail alone; we talk about how she prepared and what she would do differently this time if she had to do it all over again. We talk about how the actual experience of hiking the trail compared to what she expected. We talked about what she got out of hiking the trail, what she learned about herself and, as is often the case, and as you have heard on this podcast before, hiking a long-distance trail is as much an inner experience as it is a physical experience.

So I hope you find this episode interesting and useful, I think it is a really juicy conversation and I am super-excited to share it with you.

Holly: Hello Yvette.

Yvette: Hello! How are you?

Holly: Good, how are you doing today?

Yvette: I am doing pretty good, I am really excited to talk about my favourite topic of all time.

Holly: And I am so excited to talk to you about hiking! So why don’t we start out by having you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you first got into hiking.

Yvette: Yes sure, I guess it wasn’t like a decision I made to get into hiking. I grew up on a farm and I was always surrounded by animals and nature and I actually grew up in the mountains in New Zealand for the first five years of my life and so I was very used to being in the environment and, obviously, living in New Zealand, my backyard was filled with amazing hiking trails and things. So I would always be outdoors, doing something outdoors, whether it would be horse riding or snowboarding or something like that, but I didn’t really get into proper hiking until I moved to Canada and the Rocky Mountains and a place called Banff Alberta. Basically the scenery in Canada is just incredible and so me and my friends would often go out hiking together and that was when I learned that I really loved to go out solo hiking. So that is where the passion for it all started and then it carried on when I moved to Scotland.

Holly: So what was your first long-distance trail? What was the first time that you went from doing a day hike to a multiple day hike?

Yvette: It was actually the Scottish National Trail.

Holly: Oh my God! {laughing}

Yvette: I went from 0 to 100 with long-distance hiking! I do remember back in High School, I went on a trip and I think it was a three-day hike and that was quite easy, back then I thought it was just the worse thing ever because I was a horrible little teenager, that was all led by a group and it was a lot different to the hiking that I do today.

Holly: Wow. So tell us about the Scottish National Trail because this is something that has been on my list of things to do since 2015 and I haven’t had the time to do it, or I haven’t made the time to do it but I am dying to do it. Most people probably haven’t heard [of it], what is the Scottish National Trail?

Yvette: That is so true because when I was doing the hike, and I was telling people about it, no one had actually heard of this hike. Basically it was devised I think in 2015, maybe a little bit earlier, by a man called Cameron McNeish, he is like a bigwig in the outdoors [in] Scottish sort of circles, or industry I should say. Basically he wanted to design a hike that ran the length of Scotland and incorporated a lot of the main trails that already existed in Scotland and he actually went out and did the hike himself and then wrote a book about it. He started a website about it as well and that was the only marketing or media that was done around the hike and then it just, I don’t know, a lot of people just forgot about it or it just wasn’t really talked about much. Basically it starts at the Scottish-English border in a place called Kirk Yetholm which is a place a lot of Scots haven’t actually heard of, because it is a really tiny remote little town, and it finished in a place called Cape Wrath, which is the most northwestern point of Scotland. It doesn’t go straight across, it actually zigzags so you are actually seeing a lot of the country as you go, so it is kind of like taking the long road, the more scenic route. I think it is about 864 km long and just over 500 miles long, so it is a pretty decent walk.

Holly: It is a pretty decent walk! So what made you decide to walk the Scottish National Trail? Were you already living in Scotland at that point or did you travel there to do it? How did that work?

Yvette: I was actually living in Canada when I decided to do a long-distance hike and the original idea was that I was just going to go hiking for two weeks and just be in nature and use it as an opportunity to disconnect from technology and reconnect with myself and do some writing along the way. I was actually intending on doing this in Germany.

Holly: Oh wow.

Yvette: There was something called the Romantic Road and you can walk, hike, or drive it and that kind of appealed to me because I thought it was something a bit different and after that my plan was to move to Scotland but then the idea popped into my head: are there long distance trails in Scotland? Is there a long distance trail that I would be interested in doing because, for me, I have got Scottish ancestry and so the thought of connecting with Scotland on that kind of level really appealed to me. So yes, I just basically started googling and the Scottish National Trail popped up and as soon as I started reading about it I had this feeling: you have to do this, this is your path and you are doing it. This was before I had even researched what this path incorporated. I had no idea, I just decided: this is what I am doing and nothing is going to stop me.   

Holly: Well, you have got to go with your gut feelings sometimes, even if it is totally illogical.

Yvette: Exactly, exactly. The voice in my head was [saying]: that is is your path, you need to do that hike, so yeah.

Holly: I love it! How did you prepare for it?

Yvette: Not well! I am one of those horrible people that if you have got an exam the next day, I will leave everything to the last minute and then I will cram it in just before, that was a little bit how I prepared for this hike. I guess the planning that I did do, I bought my hiking boots a month prior to starting the hike and I wore them absolutely everywhere, I wore them in the middle of Edinburgh shopping, I wore them to the pub, I wore them absolutely everywhere because I really wanted to break them in. I also decided that I wasn’t going to catch any public transport, if I wanted to get somewhere I needed to walk there, because I wanted to build up my walking fitness a bit more and I think I did maybe one three-hour walk with my pack on, but it wasn’t full, it was kind of like an empty pack with a water bottle inside it. Basically anything that was kind of concerning me, crossings, I just googled and watched YouTube videos on what to do and luckily this hike was a hike that started out quite easily and gradually progressed so as my fitness improved as I was doing it and obviously I learned things as I went, I was able to progress through the hike.

Holly: Yeah that makes sense.

Yvette: Yeah.

Holly: So if you were to do it differently today, knowing what you know now, what would you do differently to prepare?

Yvette: Okay! That’s a good question because there were a few mistakes that I did make and which put me in quite hairy situations but I would say that I wish I had sent care packages ahead for myself because once I got to the highlands quite often I would be hiking for days without any type of civilisation and when I had to restock and buy food often it was a very small shop in the middle of nowhere where I was shopping. I feel like if I had sent care packages ahead with things that I needed, because, as I progressed through the trail, I needed different items for different parts of the trail and so I feel like that would have been a good idea. I did this really silly thing where I was like: all right, once I get to Port William I can buy this map that I need to hike the Cape Wrath trail section and of course when I got to Port William they had sold out of the specific map that I needed.

Holly: Oh!

Yvette: Yeah and so I was like: you know what, I will just start it and then I will rely on my phone, because I was using that to navigate and I will buy this map when I get to the next small town and of course that is the moment that my spare battery decided to pack it in and so my phone was actually very close to dying when I was in the middle of the highlands by myself. That was scary, so obviously, just having the right kit, carrying the right maps.

Holly: Yeah that makes sense. So you say that you were relying on your phone a lot for navigation, what were your navigations skills like before you did the Scottish National Trail? A lot of it is not signposted.

Yvette: Yeah so basically… I feel like this podcast she be titled “How Not to Hike the Scottish National Trail”.

Holly: That’s how we learn!

Yvette: I learned how to navigate more or less on the day that I started the hike, I basically because I was living in Edinburgh City Centre, there weren’t a lot of places I could go to practice using a map and a compass. I did watch lots of YouTube videos and got the basics of what to do but when I actually put it into practice it was the first day of the trail and I just remember sitting outside the Border Hotel and just testing it to see if I was walking in the right direction. Yeah I practiced a couple of times and I got the hang of it and basically I headed on from there and I didn’t get lost.

Holly: That’s good. That was my next question: did you ever get lost at any point on the trail?

Yvette: This is so surprising to me because I have the worst sense of direction ever and I rely on Google maps to get me anywhere in my car but I actually only got lost on one occasion and that was, I was still in the Scottish Borders, close to the beginning of my hike and I just completely missed a turnoff and I think I wandered 100 metres away and then realised I was lost and then headed to jump a fence and then sort of trudge through a paddock to get back to my route, but that was the only time that I actually got lost. I think the reason being was because, for me, my survival instinct was: you can’t mess this up, you have to pay attention, you have to look around you, you have to look at your map and identify where you are. I feel like, I obviously have a very strong survival instinct and I was able to do it without getting lost.

Holly: Yes, that’s actually really, really, impressive. Did you download GPX files to your phone? How were you using your phone to navigate?

Yvette: I was using an app called ViewRanger and I still use it to this day, it is an absolutely fantastic app. What I actually did, at that time I didn’t realise you could download the GPX files to ViewRanger, because it kept making me want to purchase each individual day and it was going to cost me a zillion dollars so I just didn’t bother. What I did, I was flicking between the route, on the Walk Highlands website, you can look at the route on your phone and I was flicking between that and my map to see where I was on my map and I was comparing it to the route on the Walk Highlands website.

It wasn’t until half way through my hike that I realised that I could actually download the GPX files for free and that was really good because I could just hit a button and it would tell me exactly where I was I really elation to the route. So, for the first half, I kind of just winged it, but the good thing about that was that it taught me not to be complacent, it taught me to read maps and what to do and to pay attention to my surroundings. By the second half, when I was using the GPX files and the app, I had a background knowledge that if I did mess out I could get myself out of a sticky situation.

Holly: And I think that is a really important lesson about paying attention to my surroundings, it is so easy to just kind of get lost in your head, or not pay attention, and it is like a) that is dangerous sometimes and b) you are missing out on the trail, you are missing out on all the details of the experience.

Yvette: Exactly, exactly. I feel like hiking today has become so easy because of technology but I feel like everyone should be able to learn how to read maps and use a compass and do it the old way because, if something does go wrong, you do need that knowledge. Your phone could die at any point and you would need to then use a map and a compass and it does help you to connect with your surroundings too, which is what I really love, because I feel like in a way, now when I go out hiking, I feel like I am cheating a bit, just by using my app with the GPX files downloaded already.

Holly: Yes, I know what you mean, I have done a lot of navigation and map reading training and courses and workshops and things just because I am a bit paranoid and I like to know all the things that I need to know in advance. But one of the things that I have learned is that your map and compass should be your primary navigation and any apps should be your backup, because, as you say, your phone might stop working.

Yvette: Exactly and you could use connection. 100% I think it is important to learn how to do it properly and then use technology as a backup.

Holly: I just think we have become so reliant on our phones for everything in life, just about, I think for a lot of people who are new to this, the default is: oh well, I will just use my phone.

Yvette: It does make things easier which makes things safer but on the flip side of it, if you did get into trouble you need to figure out how to get yourself out of that situation. I think balance is key, but learn how to read a map and use a compass. You don’t want to be on your phone too much when you are out in the Highlands anyway, that is the whole point!

Holly: Exactly! You are missing on all of the scenery and all of the benefits of being in the middle of nowhere.

Yvette: Yeah and one of the best things about being in the middle of nowhere is that you are disconnected from your devices and so…

Holly: I agree, I agree. So was the actual experience of the Scottish National Trail what you expected or what it different?

Yvette: Ah gosh, it was what I expected and at the same time it wasn’t because like I was saying before I just had this instinctual gut feeling that: you need to do this hike, this is very important, something is going to happen because of this that is going to shape the rest of your life.

Holly: Wow.

Yvette: So I knew that by doing that hike it was only going to bring good things to me but, at the same time, I could not have possibly have imagined how things turned out because I just had so many magical moments and I met so many incredible people and had so many amazing experiences that even now it is still quite hard to believe.

Holly: Wow, so what were some of your magical moments because I think, for people who haven’t done a long distance trail, it is hard to imagine, you are just walking, what is the magic?

Yvette: There were so many, but I think obviously when you are walking by yourself and you are putting your body under such tremendous stress of a long-distance hike, you kind of turn inward and you become so connected with yourself and you learn to listen to your soul and your intuitive voice and you start to block out the ego. I feel like that is such a magical experience in itself, I just became so connected with myself and everything around me and I am a strong believer of the law of attraction and if you aligned and connected with yourself that you are going to bring more of that to you.

If you are putting out good you are going to get good in return, but I had so many magical moments where I would just be thinking: I really need this item in my pack, or I am feeling a bit lonely right now, I wish I had someone to talk to, and I would meet someone who had the exact item that I needed and they would give it to me. And I would meet someone and just have this incredible conversation that I never would have had otherwise that completely change my life. So I feel like the connections that I made on that trail were absolutely magical.

Holly: Trail magic. So you met a lot of interesting people on the trail, was that people walking the trail, or people in the villages and towns that you were passing through?

Yvette: It was a mixture of both but I would have to say that some of my favourite meetings were just chance meetings with locals and I don’t know what it was, I think it was because I was just so connected with myself and grounded that I was able to have these incredible conversations with people. So, for example, there was one woman that I met, it was near the end of my hike actually and she offered me a bed for the night which was just incredible, the most amazing thing when you are doing a long-distance hike is that you get to sleep in a bed and have a shower, that is the best feeling ever. She told me her story about how she lost her son and her husband in the space of six months and her story impacted me so deeply because it was like: how do you get through so much loss in such a short time? And, her words were so simple: you just do, you find meaning in life and just get on and get through. That has stuck with me for years and it will stick with me for the rest of my life. I feel like I just learned so many things from people that had gone through hardships, so, yeah.

Holly: Somehow it is like, the people you meet on a trail, the conversations are so much more I don’t know, deeper, meaningful, we are so connected to ourselves and so focused that we take the meaning from conversations that maybe we wouldn’t in day-to-day life.

Yvette: Yeah I honestly feel like you are just so much more open because it is almost like when, you are out in nature, there isn’t really room for the ego, there are no influences from society and you can just be completely yourself when you are in nature and I feel like when you are authentic self it just opens up opportunities to have real conversations. It is incredible.

Holly: And you connect with people on such a different level.

Yvette: Yeah, exactly. Especially other hikers too. I think, especially when you are alone by yourself in the middle of the highlands you have a lot of time to think about stuff. And you just have these amazing conversations with yourself and then you are like: god I have got share this with someone else and then some poor person that you run into just gets an absolute earful. {laughing}

Holly: Of your philosophy.

Yvette: Of all these amazing things that you have learned. So yeah, it could be a bit of that too.

Holly: So was anything easier than you expected about walking the Scottish National Trail?

Yvette: Yeah, finishing! I think at the end of every single day I would look back and I would think: well, that was actually a lot easier than I thought it would be, because every morning I would wake up and have this fear of: oh my God what is ahead of you today? Are you going to die today? Are you going to injure yourself today? Is someone going to hurt you? You know, you have all of these fears that you build up in your mind and then I would just go and do it and then at the end of the day I would be like: why was I so worried, why was I so scared? It was actually so much easier than I thought it would be.

Holly: And was there any point when you thought: oh my God, I don’t know if I can finish this.

Yvette: In a way, I think that was more my fear talking but I just had this inner knowing that I would finish it so I had to really trust that, but I think the biggest thing for me, the only way I wasn’t going to finish was if I got injured and I couldn’t complete it. So if I had, I don’t know, fallen over and sprained my ankle or something like that I wouldn’t be able to finish, that was the only thing, I had to learn to really listen to my body and take care of it along the way because if I started to get competitive with myself, and push myself too hard, which would result in an injury, it would mean the rest of the hike would be over for me.

Holly: Yeah, that makes sense. So what was the most challenging aspect of walking the Scottish National Trail?

Yvette: It was {laughing}… definitely when I got onto the North West Highlands and the terrain was a lot harsher and when I actually did it there was a heatwave — which is just kind of unknown in Scotland — but I was hiking through of upwards of 30 degree temperatures, days on end, and my pack wasn’t light either, I didn’t have the super-expensive light weight gear; so yeah, that was pretty hard. And also, the midges were pretty hard going!

Holly: I have been watching videos of the Cape Wrath trail, because that is on my list of things to do, and there are some days when this guy is just surrounded by a cloud of midges and it is like: how do you even deal with that!?

Yvette: Honestly it takes a lot of mental power and if you can walk through there you can do anything. It is so good for your willpower.

Holly: {laughing} Wow! So midges are these very small biting insects.

Yvette: Yeah they are just like wee bitey vampires, they are awful. But they were actually, sorry to shatter your dreams, there is actually another type of bug that is even worse, which people don’t really talk about, something called clegs in Scotland and they are basically horseflies that bite and they can bite you through your clothing. They draw blood and they are attracted to sweat as well. So they are just a hiker’s nightmare.

Holly: So this guy in this video I have been watching occasionally talks about “shit flies” {laughing} I don’t know if those are the same thing but I have seen him talk about other types of flies and things and so I think I know what kind of biting flies you are talking about because we had those when I lived in Mexico and they were painful and they drew blood oh god!

Yvette: Yeah so when I did the hike, so basically clegs in Scotland, I think they come out for a couple of weeks each summer, so when I was doing my hike, unfortunately they hatched when I was in the North West highlands and unfortunately, because of the heatwave we were having, that made them just hatch like crazy and they had one of the worst cleg seasons in I think 20 years and these flies were (I am not even kidding) they actually chase you and I was surrounded by hundreds of these flies sometimes, it was just the most, I have never had to summon so much mental strength in my life than when I was dealing with these clegs.

Holly: They sound terrible!

Yvette: I don’t want to put you off or anything, it is only a couple of weeks every summer so if you can manoeuvre around that you will be fine.

Holly: And of course you never know exactly when they are going to hatch because every year is a bit different.

Yvette: Exactly, exactly. I think it was in June they started hatching for me but obviously the weather was so hot then maybe they generally tend to hatch in July or August, they came early just for me!

Holly: {laughing} Just to give you strength!

Yvette: Oh yeah, but you know what they taught me such a good lesson, so.

Holly: So what did you get out of walking the Scottish National Trail, what did you learn about yourself?

Yvette: Ah, absolutely everything, I learned so much and it is stuff that I will carry with me for the rest of my life, and I feel like it was just like a seven-week-intensive psychology course into myself, but I think some of the… I will give you an example of one of the main things that I learned which was to trust myself. So that little voice in your head that says: don’t trust that person; or actually do that thing that terrifies you but lights you up, just going and do that even though all the odds are against you. I have really learned to listen and trust that voice now and I can really say that that voice has never let me down but I feel like it is so easy to block that voice out and I am so happy that I was able to reconnect with that voice and it guides me through everyday life now. So that is really valuable yeah.  

Holly: I think a lot of people don’t realise the mental and emotional benefits of walking a long distance trail, it is like you think: oh I am going to have this outdoors adventure and it is going to be really great for my physical fitness… but it is also great for your mental and emotional fitness as well and I think people overlook that.

Yvette: Ah, it is just…! There is no way I could have learned those things that I learned in any other way so it is so beneficial for your state of mind. I have suffered from anxiety and depression in the past and I feel like it gives me so many tools to just deal with it. So yeah, I think especially today, people just need to get outside, they need to step away from technology, step away from the pressures of society and just be alone in nature because that enables you to have those really important conversations with yourself that you need to have so that you can just create the best life possible really.

Holly: Absolutely I love that. So what was it like returning from the trail? If I remember correctly from your blog posts, you had a rough time. I know a lot of people talk about trail depression but not everyone knows about that when they go into an experience like that.

Yvette: Yeah, so I had never heard of post trail depression either, I had this idea in my head that once I had finished the elation of actually finishing was just going to fix every single problem in my life and I would be happy. But what happens when you do a long distance trail like that, especially if you do it solo, you come back a completely different person but you realise that the place that you left hasn’t changed at all. You do find it quite hard to fit in because you have just had all these life-changing thoughts and ideas and you understand what is really important in life and then you come back to a society that is sort of so materialistic and consumerism is just rife, there are all these pressures from society and from friends and from family about what you should do and how you should live your life and that is really difficult to deal with when you have had such an incredible experience by yourself.

Holly: I think a lot of people don’t get it either! You are going to drop everything to walk seven weeks in Scotland, that is weird to a lot of people! To me that is my dream but to a lot of people that is like: what!

Yvette: Yeah well I mean, I am working on this a lot at the moment but I feel like thinking and taking other people’s opinions of what is best for you on board, that is a good thing to an extent but at the end of the day you know what is good for you and you know what the best thing is for you. I feel like, yeah, some people do think that is a little bit crazy and a little bit stupid even, but I feel like I would much rather live a life that was adventurous and fun and true to myself than what someone else would deem appropriate for me.

Holly: I absolutely agree. So you went from being a day hiker to walking the length of Scotland on your own. That is a huge jump. What would be your recommendations for someone who likes getting outdoors, they like hiking, they want to take it to the next level in some way but they are kind of scared about it, what would you recommend?

Yvette: I think for me, when I hiked the Scottish National Trail, I wasn’t really thinking about the distance I had to hike. I took everything day-by-day and I would wake up in the morning and I would only really think about what I had to do for that day, and maybe look at the next couple of days in advance, just to see what was up ahead. And, I think that mentality really helped me when it came to achieving my goal of completing such a difficult hike. I think you can apply that to your everyday goals.

Basically if you are a bit nervous about going out and doing a challenging hike, why not just take it step-by-step? You don’t have to rush in and do the hardest thing out there straight away (like I did). Um, but just break it down into small chunks and you will find that as you slowing increase the difficulty you will get more confident and gain more skills and it is going to be safer for you. Yeah I think just breaking it down and then also it is really good idea to do your research, so watch YouTube videos, google a whole bunch of stuff, because that is really going to help you when you are going out and doing something, if you are feeling a bit nervous, I think that has really helped me especially.

Holly: So as you have said, you don’t really need to go from 0 to 100 with your hiking, like you did! {laughing}

Yvette: No!

Holly: So what are some different ways people can stretch themselves in the outdoors?

Yvette: Well, I mean there are so many different ways and I think it is up to the individual to know, they know what they want to do, and what they want to achieve, but I think wild camping is quite an eye-opening experience. I remember the first night that I wild camped on the hike and I was terrified. I just had all these thoughts that something bad was going to happen to me and I was perfectly fine, nothing happened to me — apart from a bit of a stressful sleep — I had a really good experience. The more that I went on and wild camped, the more I got used to it and I realised: actually if something bad is going to happen it is most likely going to be in a big city rather than when you are out in the middle of nowhere away from everyone.

So I think, giving wild camping a go is a great way to just, I guess, get adept at hiking and being in nature and you don’t have to do it alone, you can do it with a group of friends and work your way up to that. I feel for me what really increased my confidence with hiking was setting up camp somewhere and staying there the night and having to go through that whole routine of setting up my camp and preparing my food, sleeping, you know, by myself in the middle of nowhere. I think that is a good challenge but it could be…some people might not be into wild camping so it could just be something like, if you are a bit nervous, joining a group of hikers that are a little bit more advanced than you and just going out with them and learning from them, you know, building that confidence so that you can go out and do it by yourself.

Holly: Yes and I think taking courses, outdoor courses, while that is expensive it can also be a good way because you have got someone in charge of the experience and who supposedly knows what they are doing, so that could be helpful too.

Yvette: Oh 100%! For me I have taught myself everything but it would have been so much easier to go on a course and learn it from a professional.

Holly: With wild camping, and I think that is a perfect example, I have still not gone wild camping alone but a couple of years ago I realised that was something I wanted to do but I had never really gone camping at all on my own — I had only gone camping with other people and it had been 20 years since I had gone camping, so I didn’t know what to do. So I literally got online and searched “wild camping courses”… because I thought not many people teach this {laughing} so there was this guy who offered wild camping courses where you borrowed all of his gear so you could try it out and see if you liked it. That was really useful and that gave me the confidence to later, I still haven’t gone wild camping on my own, but to go camping on my own in camp grounds. So yeah.

Yvette: That’s such a great tip, I never would have thought to do something like that.

Holly: People teach all kinds of things these days! {laughing}

Yvette: Yeah that’s amazing.

Holly: So for someone who is looking to stretch and to up their game in hiking how do you know what is a good stretch for you? How do you know if a trail is too much, or if it is too technical, how do you know if it is a good fit or not?

Yvette: I think personally, I feel like now I don’t have to prove anything to myself because I did one of the hardest hikes in Great Britain, so now that I know and can trust my inner voice I listen to that a lot. I feel like if you are just wanting to do something for your ego, for example, if you want to finish a hike in a specific amount of time; if you want to continue on you are almost at the top of a Munro and the weather starts turning bu5 you are just there and you have kind of had that thought: well it is not really safe to continue on. But your ego is saying: no but you are so close just go and do it! I think you would need to be very aware of your ego and I feel like if you are trying to do something to please your ego it is not right, you need to listen to that little voice inside your head that is saying: this is not a good idea. Yes, so it is different for everyone, that is what I do.

Holly: Yes, that makes sense, a lot of people probably get themselves in trouble because they don’t leave themselves enough time to complete a trail until they start doing more and more miles than their body is used to or their body is capable of doing and that is when the injuries and stuff like that happens.

Yvette: Yeah, there was one part of the Scottish National Trail where I was so determined to walk every single step of the way that I had really bad hip pain and this was basically the third day into my hike. And I had really bad hip pain and I had to then climb this hill which was quite steep and I met this woman and she was like: you are in no shape to walk up that hill, let me drive you up there. And I was like: you know what? I could walk up this hill and potentially injure myself which will potentially stop me from finishing or I could have this one little cheat and look after my body and continue going. So I feel that decision doesn’t bother me anymore, I will go back one day and hike that hill by myself but I feel like, you know, not letting the ego get in the way of doing something stupid.

Holly: Absolutely, that is a really good lesson to learn because a lot of people can be purists about doing a trail and think: I have got to walk every single step otherwise it doesn’t count.

Yvette: Exactly. You have got to listen to that inner voice that is just saying: no you don’t have to do this, do this instead.

Holly: And accepting help which for me personally is a really difficult thing, I don’t know if I could have said yes to that because I am just really bad at accepting help when it is offered.

Yvette: Yeah, that too!

Holly: So we had a mini conversation on Instagram last week about getting outdoors and making mistakes and you said you have learned so much from making mistakes in the outdoors. So what kinds of mistakes have you made in the outdoors?

Yvette: I have had so many and to be honest I am so glad I made those mistakes because it taught me so much, I think my biggest mistake was not purchasing a map in advance for the Cape Wrath trail section. I think, by that stage, I was really in hiking mode and I potentially could have gotten myself out of the sticky situation when my phone almost died and I didn’t have the physical map to rely on, I feel like that was one of the biggest mistakes and obviously I am never going to do that again. There were so many little things as well, when I started my hike and I realised that I had never walked downhill in my hiking boots and as soon as I started walking downhill, which was on the first day, I got really bad blisters and I basically had to wrap my feet up, and keep going and just walk through the pain.

Holly: That’s so awful, when your feet hurt when you are on a trail that is the worst because that is your means of transportation.

Yvette: Exactly, that is what gets you from A to Z. Yeah and I think just checking your gear as well because another thing I learned was that my rain jacket wasn’t that waterproof and I was halfway through a six day wild hike when it started raining and I got soaked through and I was three days from civilisation and again that could have turned into a dangerous situation if I developed hypothermia or something like that but luckily it was really warm. So I survived. {laughing}

Holly: It was unusually warm! {laughing}

Yvette: I know I was very, very, lucky.

Holly: So what would you say to someone who is afraid or fearful of making mistakes alone in the outdoors? That can be scary.

Yvette: Yeah, I would say that the survival instinct is something that is very powerful. So try and prepare as best as you can but sometimes things do go wrong that are out of your control and when your survival instinct kicks in it is a very powerful thing and I mean, maybe I am lucky, maybe that is just something that I have got, or I have developed, but I feel like when things go wrong you just have to look for solutions, accept the problem, look for solutions and just try and keep yourself safe. At the end of the day if you have to carry an alert device with you that is one of the best backups that you can have. I would probably look into buying something like that if I was going to go and do another hike somewhere really remote as well.  

Holly: So that is really interesting, because I have been looking into those on and off but I have never actually needed one, so I haven’t bought one, have you done the research? Is there one of them that you recommend? I know there are pros and cons to them all.

Yvette: Yeah, I did a bit of research myself and I ended up buying one so I can’t recommend a product or anything but then again just talk to people in the outdoors and see what they recommend.

Holly: So what are your thoughts about women hiking solo on the Scottish National Trail or wild camping alone? Because I think a lot of women are really, really, scared about getting outdoors alone, and obviously it can be done.

Yvette: Definitely, definitely it can be done and that is something that upsets me that a lot of women I talk to say: oh you know I would love to go out and do that but you know I am too scared, or I don’t have the ability and they kind of come up with all these excuses and it does make me quite sad and I have personally had all those thoughts run through my head as well. Honestly, my experience, 99% of people I met on the trail wanted to help me and they went out of their way to help me. So that was just so reassuring to me and I feel like if something bad does happen to a young woman whether that be in the city or out in the woods or anything like that it is just a really unfortunate situation. Obviously do try and plan and prepare and so things as safely as possible but from my experiences, I go hiking solo all the time and I have never had a bad experience. I have had thoughts and worries when I have met people on the trail: could this person hurt me? I am in a vulnerable position right now but nothing bad has ever happened to me, so yeah.

Holly: I think the fear is greater than the reality. If someone is going to attack a woman, or if someone is looking to prey on women, then they are not going to hike out to the middle of nowhere to do it.

Yvette: Exactly they are going to be in the city or maybe in a smaller town or village, they are going to be in places where there are lots of other people around and facilities and things they are not going to be in the middle of the Highlands.

Holly: Waiting on the off chance that a woman is going to walk by on her own. {laughing}

Yvette: Exactly there is no one out there, they are not going to waste their time out there. I never felt safer than when I was wild camping in the highlands because there aren’t many people around, so.

Holly: Yeah, I think that is a good point, the further you get away from people the safe you are.

Yvette: Yeah, yeah.

Holly: So what is it like when you are out alone on a trail for seven weeks? I know we have talked about this already a little bit earlier but what are the internal transformations that happen? Because you are so isolated and just so connected with nature.

Yvette: Yeah, well a lot of stuff runs through your head. I think I had time to reflect on every single problem, insecurity, fear, across my entire life. It was really hard sometimes, I am not going to lie, there were times when I felt really lonely, there were times when my anxiety played up and I just felt terrified and numb. I knew if I just got up and kept walking every single day that by the time I got to my destination at night and set up my camp I would feel euphoric.

One thing I kept on saying to myself was: keep on walking, keep on waking, keep on walking. It doesn’t matter how fast or how slow you are going just keep putting one foot in front of the other and keep going. It was challenging I think mentally when you have got those voices in your head saying: why did you do this, you are not capable of this? Something bad is going to happen… It is so challenging to walk through those thoughts and get through each day but as I kept walking my confidence grew and I started to have this amazing inner transformation and I am so glad that I kept walking because there were times when I did want to give up and there were times when I was crying on the side of a mountain literally screaming into the hills, being like: why did I do this? And obviously dealing with past traumas and things.

Holly: Yeah.

Yvette: And it was really, really hard, but if you want to be comfortable in life you have to embrace the uncomfortable and have to go through the messy stuff to get to the other side. I am so grateful that I had that experience with myself even though it was one of the hardest things I have ever done.

Holly: And from a physical perspective did you get to a tipping point with your fitness? You went from being this new hiker to it being easier.

Yvette: Ah yeah definitely I think it was on day five that I noticed that my body was getting hiking fit. So the first four days were just hell on my body. Then, I remember, when I reached Milngavie and I was hiking to Drymen and I think it was the first day of the West Highland Way that I was walking, I was lapping people, I was running past people with this gigantic pack and people were just looking at me like: this girl is nuts. So your fitness does pick up really quickly.

Holly: That is really good to hear because I have never done a trail that is longer than 100 miles so that is one of my fears, can my body handle that? Will it improve or will it break down? {laughing}

Yvette: Yeah, just accept that the first few days are going to suck, especially if you are carrying a pack but the body is an incredible machine and it is so adaptable and, as long as you get through the first few days, the rest your body will handle. It is your mind, the mental aspect of hiking, which is going to be the battle.

Holly: Did you start hiking longer days? Did you start extending your days? How did that happen?

Yvette: My days were starting out quite long because I was so unfit so I was trying to keep up with this pace which the first week the hiking was easy but some of them were quite long days. But then, again when I got to the end, and the terrain was a lot rougher and it slowed me down, because I was dealing with fog and there weren’t any paths and that definitely did slow me down. I don’t think I really cared a whole lot about my pace because I always think that it is better to slow down than it is to speed up because you are going to enjoy the scenery more and you are going to have a better time if you are trying to rush by everything and you are trying to hit a target, you do miss a lot.

Holly: So did you have a target for finishing the Scottish National Trail or were you just like: I am going to see how long it takes?

Yvette: Um, yes I try to stick to the route that is on the Walk Highlands as best as I could but I found that wasn’t always possible and I just kind of day by day decided where I was going to set up camp because sometimes the route would have me finish in a town or a city and I wouldn’t want to wild camp there, so I would need to continue walking past that, or stop just before. In the last two weeks there was actually a storm just before I went into the highlands and so I actually had to rest in Fort William for a couple of days while the storm passed but I had allocated myself an extra week. I anticipated that the hike was going to take me five-and-a-half weeks I think, and then, it ended up taking me six-and-a-half weeks. So I am glad that I gave myself that extra week just to deal with things that popped up like the storm and certain days I just didn’t have as much energy as other days so I couldn’t hit my target. I think allowing yourself a little bit extra time is already a good idea.

Holly: Yeah, and did you hike every single day or did you give yourself one rest day every week or two?

Yvette: Yes I think I hiked six days on and two days off.

Holly: Oh good!

Yvette: No sorry, six days on and one day off.

Holly: Right that makes sense, oh good, good, good. Did you wild camp every single night or did you eve have a bothy night or a hostel night or a B&B night?

Yvette: Yes, so I tried to stay in a hostel, or a bed and breakfast, at least one or two nights a week, I kind of tied up my refuel so I would aim to be in accommodation so I could have a shower and reorganise myself and actually have a good sleep in a bed and not on the ground.

Holly: As far as resupply I know you said you sent yourself care packages but was it fairly easy to find decent foods when you needed them?

Yvette: Yeah actually that was one thing I didn’t plan that well, I kind of looked a few days in advance and just said: yep, I can refuel there. But, especially on the Cape Wrath trail, all of the shops are quite well stocked because they do have hikers coming through. So they are quite aware to carry that type of food. However, sometimes you are hiking three to six days without running into a shop or a supermarket, so you do need to carry five or six days worth of food and you do need to restock up at one of these small stores. But yeah, it can definitely be done, that is what I did, but I think sending yourself care packages in advance with specific foods that you think you need, or specific items, is a really good idea.

Holly: Yeah, that sounds like a really good plan. And what about people on the trail, were there any parts where it was busy or were you just really alone a lot of the time?

Yvette: As I progressed through the hike I saw less people. When I started on the Scottish Borders I was hiking a part of St Cuthbert’s Way, and I was hiking it in the opposite direction, so I did meet a lot of hikers on that trail and the first day of the West Highland Way as well there were heaps of people on the trail. Then when I got to the Cape Wrath Trail section I did stay in a few bothies, but you usually meet people in bothies as well, but they were usually staying there for a weekend or to do part of the Munros in the area.

Holly: Do you have any final tips for someone who wants to up their game in their hiking?

Yvette: Yeah I guess this is summarising a little bit but for me the scariest thing about the hike was the unknown and not knowing what to expect but when I went out and did it I realised that it wasn’t actually as hard as I thought it would be. So just be aware that the thoughts in your head are quite often going to hold you back, that what you need to do is try and help yourself in that area. Do some research about the hike and talk to people who have done the hike before, put yourself on a course if you think that you need to learn the skills to go and do the hike. Just basically prepare as much as you can and don’t look at it as one big whole thing that you need to achieve just do it step-by-step, take it day-by-day and if at some point you do feel like it is too much there is no harm in saying: I have pushed myself a bit too hard, I am going to stop here, I am going to go back home and I am going to relearn some of the stuff, I am going to improve my fitness, get better gear, whatever it is, you can always go back and do it another time.

Holly: Yeah absolutely better to do that than injure yourself seriously.

Yvette: Exactly, the hills are always going to be there it is just the ego that is going to feel a little bit bruised but you know what it is so much better to be safe rather than sorry.

Holly: Yeah absolutely. So Yvette where can people find you online?

Yvette: I have a travel blog called: Wayfaring Kiwi, which is basically about adventure travel in Scotland, you can find me there. I hang around on facebook quite a lot as well and I am on Instagram, my Instagram handle is WayfaringKiwi11, so it is a little bit different. I also, I do have a podcast that I have just started with my partner and it is basically all about our life in Scotland and you can find that on Spotify and Apple podcasts and that is called: Life in Scotland.

Holly: I really enjoyed the first episode, the two of you have such a great dynamic. I recommend it!

Yvette: Ah, that makes me so happy. It is hard work doing this podcast stuff!

Holly: {laughing} I know! The two of you were great together it was so cute, I really enjoyed it, even though I am not looking to date anyone in Scotland it was so enjoyable.

Yvette: I am so glad you enjoyed it.

Holly: Right thanks so much for joining today I am super excited to get this out to my podcast. Where can people get this out to you if they have any questions?

Yvette: Either send me a message on instagram or on Facebook or pop me an email at [email protected] I love answering questions about the Scottish National Trail, I have a few people already who helped me to do the trail, if you have any questions for me I am more than happy to answer them.

Holly: And you have a book coming out at some point?

Yvette: Oh yeah, I completely forgot about that!

Holly: {laughing} I can’t wait for it, it is on the top of my mind.

Yvette: Yeah I am in the process of drafting my first book about my hike on the Scottish National Trail and hopefully, I am hoping it is going to be out maybe this year, maybe next year, I need to figure a lot of stuff out but if you are interested in learning about my experience hiking the Scottish National Trail and probably more how not to hike the SNT, you can actually sign up, you can put it in the show notes or something but I can give you a link. You can sign up and receive a notification when my book will be published and available for purchase.

Holly: Yes and in the meantime you have got three mini guides on your blog which are really, really, useful.

Yvette: Yes a really in-depth guide of week one and week two of the Scottish National Trial and I have also written a general guide to the entire trail so I have included a lot of information as I did it because I know there is a lot information and there is no official guide to the Scottish National Trail so if you are thinking about doing it hopefully my guides will help you out.

Holly: I am so excited I can’t wait. Thank you again for joining us and thank you for listening.

Holly: Thank you for listening, please drop me a line and let me know wha you thought about this topic you can email me at: [email protected]. If you would like to connect with other listeners or get support on your journey I would love for you to join my private community on Patreon, that is http://Patreon.com/HollyWorton. Thank you so much for listening and I look forward to seeing you next week.