I have been Treasurer of the SWLG since 1988, when I was a working Chartered Accountant. I was brought up in Surrey, but after several walking holidays in Scotland when I was a student, I decided to come and live here in 1975, and have never regretted this. I have climbed most of the Munros and visited many of the islands, the best ones many times, with some dull, and some difficult ones still to do. Lucky enough to get early retirement three years ago, I am now studying full time for a degree in geology at the University of Aberdeen, in the hope that I will eventually be able to understand a bit about the country and rocks I go wandering over.

I love the wildness you can sometimes find in Scotland, and hate the desecration of the mountains by dams, roads, bulldozed tracks and their scars, fences, wind turbines, pylons, ski-lifts, sharp-edged forestry, and too many sheep and deer preventing regeneration of native trees and plants. Keep roads and quadbikes to the valleys and periphery, bring back highland ponies for transport in the mountains, and let the beaver and the wolf roam free.

About 20 years ago, I joined the SWLG and was enthused by the open, friendly and democratic nature of the AGMs. In the early 1990s, with Lionel as Co-ordinator, we had fine meetings like the one where that fellow Ian Wilson (who just happened to own the mineral rights to lots of potential superquarry sites) helpfully showed us why large, exploitative developments have to be opposed. Had such superquarries been approved 10 years ago, it would be much harder to resist the current assault from the profit seekers and their bogus green revolution of wind turbines for all. Cries of “it’s too late now, the wild lands have been industrialised already” are mercifully premature, though the threats are legion and have feet of concrete!

The SWLG inspired my group of young hill-goers then, so I believe we can help develop awareness of, and rouse opposition to, the threats facing Scotland’s wild land now. If we allow the exploiters and despoilers (the very same people who brought us Credit Crunchies for breakfast, mind) to proceed unchecked, then future generations will curse our stupidity, whilst they pay the full price for the greed of our times. Some legacy.

Oh, and I’m 41, a piper and traditional singer, who enjoys the rock-climbing and bothying life, which I preferred to attending university.

Calum is a keen hillwalker, climber and amateur photographer with a strong interest in conservation, having spent as much time as possible in the wilder places of Scotland since moving from mid-Wales to Skye at the age of five. Calum has a BSc in Astrophysics and an MSc in Managing Sustainable Mountain Development, which focussed on the Scottish environment and the issue of re-wilding. He has worked in conservation in Scotland, the USA and Slovakia, and is currently pursuing a PhD in statistical modelling of rainforest ecology at St Andrews University - within easy reach of some wild land!

Christiane moved to Scotland in 1999 after falling in love with the west coast of Scotland during a hiking holiday. As a rock lover, she ended up studying Geology at the University of Edinburgh and did her mapping dissertation in the shadow of Bla Bheinn on the Isle of Skye. Despite several weeks of solid rain and midgies she still loved Scotland and decided to make it her permanent home after a two year adventure on New Zealand's west coast.  Wanting to make the world a better place, she quit her Geology profession, started working for a small charity (Bumblebee Conservation Trust) and did an online masters in Sustainable Mountain Development. She now works as an occasional tour guide for a local hiking company.

Other that that she enjoys living in rural Perthshire, tending to her young family, dog, cat, chickens and anything else that comes her way. To recharge her batteries she tends to disappear for a weekend into hills on her own or with the dog ever so often...