The stories are endless.

Leg Five - Selkirk to Melrose.

Distance: 11.6 miles (69.6 total)

Time: 4 hrs 58 mins.

Wildlife: Rabbit, heron, jumping deer, not jumping frog (dead)

Barnaby's Song of the Day: The Boss (and if you don't know who The Boss is, then away and boil yer heid)

So today was the last leg and it was a beautiful leg. But this evening I want to talk about why we're doing this walk, why we created this walk, and what we'll create on future walks.

To start us off, we need to talk about why I did this walk. I did this walk because of all the stories I heard Uncle Jimmy and Daddy talking about when they were remembering their walks. When they told those stories they were always laughing away, especially the story about when Daddy got them so, so, so lost that they had to take off their shoes and socks and cross a big, cold river in the pouring rain.

Those stories inspired me to want to do my own walks with Daddy, so that we could create our own stories to share. You might remember that yesterday I talked about how we hadn't met anybody on The Borders Abbeys Way, but today was an exception because as we were descending from this leg's peak (where we sang all seven verses of Praise to the Holiest!) we met two experienced walkers sitting on seats taking in the wonderful views across the hills. We stopped and talked with them for quite a while and they recommended several walks that we didn't know about, but one of the walks that kept popping up was The West Highland Way, which has made me even more eager to do that walk at some point. It felt good to talk to somebody who knew all about The Borders and who shared our excitement about walking.

I've been reflecting a lot about how we wouldn't be here now having accomplished this walk if it weren't for Godfather Paul saying to Daddy, over twenty years ago, "We're going on holiday for the weekend"; what he meant by that though was not a relaxing drive to the beach and sunbathing in boiling hot weather, no, what he meant was going off and doing a forty-two mile walk in one day.

At the end of my first long walk in Scotland I feel overcome with happiness, excitement and a sense of achievement and I knew that this was going to be a first walk of many. I especially hope that I will do some of those future walks with Godfather Paul, Uncle Jimmy and hopefully even James...

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Daddy's postscript:

Barnaby's biggest walking obsession is with the pilgrimage I made in 2010 from Iona to Lindisfarne. He so wants us to repeat the walk together, and we're already trying to figure out if it might be possible during his extended GCSE summer holiday... only six years away.

One of the things that most intrigues Barnaby about that walk is the idea that it was a route that I planned and created myself. The idea of creating your own walk really tugs at his imagination. Several times this week he's asked me to show him how I plan walks; "I want to learn, so that I can plan walks of my own."

The stories go on, and they are indeed endless.