Having grown up on the coast in East Lothian in Scotland, it feels as if the big skies and the sounds of the sea are in my DNA. I didn’t realise this in my childhood, or even well into adulthood. It was only some years ago, when living in Edinburgh, and after a wirehaired dachshund called Harris joined our family, that this connection became very clear to me as we started walking more regularly on the beaches of East Lothian.

And over the years since, this connection has grown. It has grown through our walks with Harris and Bracken, and now with Rafferty. It has grown through the long evenings of summer, meandering along the shores at Yellowcraig and Gullane and Eyebroughy and Ravensheugh and Belhaven, watching the sun set over the water. It has grown through our walks around John Muir Country Park, watching the seasons shift as the ferns changed from bud to green to rust. And it has grown through the wind-blown winter walks, clouds scudding across the sea, the cold biting into us. A season we love.

And the thing I’ve realised, over the last few years in particular, is how much these places and moments ground me. It isn’t simply about walking. It’s about being reset, physically and mentally. It’s about discovering calm in the shifting light and the skyscapes, and in the constant rhythm of the tides. These are the places that hold and form my best memories. These are the grounding places, and this is my space to share them.