The Scottish-born John Muir is revered among American environmentalists as the man who inspired the US conservation movement and sparked the creation of its national parks. His achievements put him high on the list of late 19th- and early 20th-century environmental greats: he camped in the wild with the US president Theodore Roosevelt and would sometimes give his name and address as John Muir, Earth-planet, Universe, yet he is little known in his home country. Muir spent his first 11 years in the coastal town of Dunbar in East Lothian before his family emigrated to the United States. But his formative encounters with the natural world around Dunbar were pivotal in shaping his later Herculean achievements. This walk follows the John Muir Way from the seaside resort of North Berwick through countryside and some eye-popping landscapes to Muir’s childhood home, now converted into a gem of a discovery centre about the man and his – and our – place in the scheme of things. This is a long walk, but almost all flat and the walking is easy.
1. START We begin on North Berwick’s beach front (NT553855), which gives wonderful views of Bass Rock, home to an enormous gannet colony. To learn more, you can pop into the Scottish Seabird Centre (01620 890202,
www.seabird.org) before following the John Muir Way (JMW) fingerpost signs as they guide you up Church Street and through the Lodge Grounds parkland. The path climbs, giving a first glimpse of the remarkable North Berwick Law. You are briefly navigated through a housing estate, but suddenly this iconic hill is ahead.
2. North Berwick Law rises abruptly from the surrounding flatlands and can be seen from Ben Lomond, 75 miles away. Covered with gorse, it is a remnant of volcanic activity and can be climbed easily enough – but perhaps on another day. Follow the JMW signs as they lead you out into open country, first following field edges before tracking a minor road to reach East Wood. Throughout this walk, the path sneaks into field and coppices, shielding the walker from busier roads – and here is no exception, the path rising and swooping gently, including a magical grove of rhododendrons, before entering Craigmoor Wood. The walking around here has a lovely symmetry: straight field edges lined by hedgerows with long sightlines and huge skies. To the south is another volcanic pimple on the landscape: Traprain Law.
3. The path rises to Drylaw Hill, all 60m of it, and there are superb views in all directions of North Berwick Law, Bass Rock, the village of East Linton and – some way to the east – John Muir Country Park. The JMW sweeps through East Linton, bearing left along Preston Road. Opposite the nursery, the JMW picks up the River Tyne (not the Newcastle one!) for a lovely stretch that passes Preston Mill and criss-crosses a succession of footbridges, a weir and a ford. At Tyninghame Bridge, the path ducks under a tunnel and follows field edges and a quiet lane towards Hedderwick Sands.
4. There are some magical, Narnia-like pools here, where the sea muscles up against a man-made embankment. The footpath teeters above the North Sea and you may see some startling, petrified driftwood washed up on the shoreline. This is a birder’s paradise all year round. The path continues through the Hedderwick Hill plantation to reach a vast expanse of saltmarsh. If the tide’s out you can walk across it, using a lonely bridge that is marooned in the heart of the sands. Otherwise, the JMW follows the sea wall towards the red cliff-tops.
5. A flurry of steps takes you up and around the edge of a golf course, with truly wonderful views across the Firth of Forth to Fife and the Isle of May, looming behind the ever present Bass Rock. The cliff formations above Belhaven Bay are bewitching, with the red sandstone whittled into wafer-thin ledges and pyramids that front thin air.
6. As the cliff-top path enters Dunbar, it climbs and swoops past lovely, sheltered and hidden bays, full of rocks, skerries and a miniature volcanic plug known as Doo Rock. The young Muir spent much of his time here and later wrote: ‘I loved to wander... along the seashore to gaze and wonder at the shells and seaweeds, eels and crabs in the pools among the rocks.’ Close by, in the High Street, you’ll find his birthplace, a town house that tells the story of his life and work. Muir’s love of wildlife was sparked by walks with his grandfather, and he wrote of once discovering a nest of field mice in a haystack: ‘No hunter could have been more excited in discovering a bear and her cubs in a wilderness den.’