An Interview with Our Founder, Paul Easto

We brought in a huge amount of food. We went to town. All the stuff that you need for four days in the wilderness.

And we arrived to find the two stalkers’ ponies ready for action, so we loaded them up. The only problem was they didn’t really have panniers at all that we could properly load, so we stacked everything up very high to the point that they almost looked like a mobile leaning Tower of Pisa.

Something then set one of them off, and what I can only describe as like a scene from a rodeo where the pony started bucking and everything was just flying.

What did we learn from the experience? I think there’s nothing wrong with a sense of adventure, but be prepared for the unexpected. I guess that’s probably the biggest takeaway that we’ve used over the last 25 years.

The very first guest to book with us, it was in the days of telephones and fax machines, dial-up internet, and when the first booking form arrived through the fax, the sense of surprise and wonder that we’ve managed to persuade someone to travel with us, and you just wanted to give that person a hug and thank them.

I’m just back from a trip that I first guided 20 years ago. So it’s quite emotional, to be honest, going through a lot of the places that we began with and travelling by bike and seeing places in the same way, but also in a different way. And it just led me to reflect that I’ve been awfully lucky to do this as a job, I guess, over the last 25 years and just would love for that to continue and sharing what we have here with people from around the world.

It’s a privilege, and we feel very lucky to be able to do it.

Oh, yeah. So I’m Paul Easto. I started Wilderness Scotland some 25 years ago. Still here, still letting me out the office to guide trips with clients, but it’s been nice seeing you. I’ve got to head out now. Have a good day.