My first encounter with a Scottish bothy came in my mid-teens. I was wholly uninterested in anything outdoorsy throughout my school years, but for some reason, I gladly put my name in the hat to be drawn as one of the chosen few, ready to embark on a school bothy adventure up north. Perhaps it was intrigue, excitement at the prospect of an exclusive opportunity, or just plain old ‘fomo’ that encouraged me to step outside my comfort zone. Either way, it’s a memory that’s stuck with me all these years. The creepy old attic bed, straw bursting out the mattress. The dark rooms where we cooked and slept, top to tail on the stone floor. The river flowing outside where we washed our dishes. And that stash of Sweetheart Stout and men’s magazines that no doubt made our teachers blush. It was like nothing I’d ever experienced before or, until very recently, since.

For decades bothy locations were kept hush hush, accessible only to those in the know. Directions were passed on by word of mouth and ‘bothying’ a hobby enjoyed by relatively few. The remoteness and anonymity associated with bothies meant that it never even occurred to me in adulthood to seek one out. Indeed, I wouldn’t even have known how, the location of my inaugural bothy a complete mystery to me.

But the times they are a changing. In 2009 the MBA (Mountain Bothy Association) publicly published the grid references of all their bothies. And in 2017 Geoff Allan’s The Scottish Bothy Bible helped make even the most far flung Scottish bothy seem within reach to those with an adventurous streak.