This week is our birthday at Hillgoers! I’d like to send a huge thank you to everyone for your support so far! I’ve had a fantastic time over the last year, meeting many of you, hopefully inspiring outdoor adventures and building your love for our beautiful land.

As unpredictable summer in Scotland can be, I've been very fortunate not to have postponed any of my planned walks.

A selection of photos and highlights from June, my favourite moment watching my talented daughter Emma play fiddle at An Lochan Uaine, the green lochan.

With glorious weather all week I had an itching to get up high for a camp and take in the sunset over the Cairngorms

Fantastic conditions in the Cairngorms for our bike and hike event to Carn a' Mhaim yeasterday. Why not join us for the next one, or contact us to arrange a trip for you! See our events page for planned outings.

I try to get out every other day for a walk and I try and do a long one at least once a week. When I say long, 25km plus, into a remote area where I can look at that conditions and see the seasonal changes.

Each time I go out for a walk I like to learn something new. I've been using field study council publications for a while now, they produce great fold out study guides that fit easily into my rucksack, ranging from lichens to rocks.

What fantastic conditions we had for our guided walk on Sunday. A light wind over the tops giving a little wind chill but nothing significant.

I was up Bennachie last Saturday running a beginners navigation course. From the excellent visitor centre, there are good walks all over the hill, follow the Gordon Way, then up to Oxen Craig or straight up to Mither Tap

We are very lucky in Scotland, not only do we have the most beautiful landscape on this planet but we also have a right of access to most of the land and inland waters, meaning we can go almost everywhere responsibly.

Mondays don't get much better than this! The good forecast meant I ditched the emails and chores and headed for the hills!

Morven in Aberdeenshire is a Corbett standing at 871m. There are a couple of ways to go up the hill, from Logie Coldstone side. You can also approach from the west, taking in Mona Gowan (749m) or from Ballater.

This week I decided to return to an old favourite, Loch Callater. I think the first time I trekked round the loch was probably circa 1995 and there was deep snow all round.

I went up Bennachie last November to take in the sunset, it was one of those days where a warm south westerly wind was bringing over beautiful lenticular clouds, with plenty of visibility, so great for photography. I took a few photos that day, in all directions and I also took one using ViewRanger's new Skyline addition.

I've lost count of the times I've been to Lochnagar but I'll never tire of it. There's a reason why so many songs and poems have been sung about the mountain and loch, it's a mysterious place with a stunning landscape that looks different each time I visit.

TGOC challenge 2016

I had a great wee wander in Braemar yesterday, the village was looking festive in the frost and the Christmas tree looked fab with it's woollen decorations! A double shot coffee in the Bothy helped warm me up too, minus 8 degC wakes your senses in the morning.

I've been itching to get up to the Cairngorms after watching the justified social media buzz from last week. The weather last week was amazing, with blue skies, fogbows, brocken spectres and unicorns (joking) I couldn't wait to get into the higher hills.

Hill of Fare, just up from Banchory, is an ideal venue to teach hill and navigation skills.

I had a superb 4 day trek around the Lake District in August, thanks to a route suggested by Peter Dixon (@munro277) on twitter!