Hamish Brown

Hamish Brown M.B.E. FRSGS is a professional writer, lecturer and photographer specialising in mountain and outdoor topics. He is best known for his walking exploits in the Scottish Highlands, having completed multiple rounds of the Munros and being the first person to walk all the Munros in a single trip with only ferries and a bicycle as means of transport.

Early life
Born in Colombo, Ceylon (now modern-day Sri Lanka) on 13 August 1934, he lived in Japan for a time and then Singapore; escaping in 1942 as it fell to the Japanese. He lived in South Africa for two years as a refugee before returning to live in Scotland at the end of World War II. His family lived in Dollar and Brown spent much of his youth exploring the nearby Ochil Hills which awakened his interest in the great outdoors. He was educated at Dollar Academy.

He travelled extensively in the Middle East and East Africa during the 1950s when serving in the RAF for his National Service. Between 1960 and 1972 he worked at Braehead School, Buckhaven, Fife and was in charge of outdoor activities at the school, introducing many of the pupils to walking in the Scottish Highlands as well as other outdoor activities. After a spell as a County Adviser, he decided to try to make a living as a freelance writer and photographer, specialising on "anything to do with mountains".

Outdoor media
On 4 April 1974, Brown set off on his trip to complete all the Munro mountains in one trip. He completed the journey on 24 July; a journey of 112 days during which time he covered 1,639 miles, climbed 289 peaks and wore out three pairs of boots. He only used the Isle of Mull and Isle of Skye ferries and a bicycle as transport.

Brown's 1974 journey was documented in the book Hamish’s Mountain Walk, the book won an award from the Scottish Arts Council. He followed his Munros walk with the longest trip over the English, Irish and Welsh peaks, told in the book Hamish’s Groats End Walk. Brown also thought up the Ultimate Challenge (now called the TGO Challenge, after The Great Outdoors Magazine, not to be confused with the Australian series, which sponsors and organises the event), a fortnight-long endurance walk from coast-to-coast across Scotland – the book Scotland Coast To Coast is an account of a typical Challenge walk. Great Walking Adventure covered some of his more distant treks to Corsica, Norway, the Andes, Atlas and Himalayas.

He has continued to write books and contribute to outdoor magazines. He has written or edited over forty books and written numerous articles, many of which have appeared in The Scotsman and the Evening News and a selection of these were published in the book Travels. He has also edited two poetry books: Poems of the Scottish Hills and the huge Speak to the Hills besides a volume of his own poems Time Gentlemen. Two of Brown's best known books about the Scottish Highlands, Hamish's Mountain Walk and Climbing The Corbetts were released as a compendium in 1996 by the publishers Baton Wicks.

In 1997, Brown received an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Letters from the University of St Andrews for his contribution to mountain writing and poetry. In 2000, he was made an MBE and a fellow of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society. In May 2007, he was awarded an honorary degree from the Open University as Doctor of the University.

Brown did a lot of his walking with his pet Shetland Sheepdogs, firstly Kitchy and then Storm. Both climbed hundreds of mountains in his company, including completed rounds of Munros, the former dog credited as the first to achieve this feat.

For many years Brown lived in Kinghorn in Fife and now lives in Burntisland. He spends several months every year in Morocco, a country very close to his heart; having first visited there in 1965 and has returned annually ever since to walk in the Atlas Mountains. In 2006, he released the book The Mountains Look on Marrakech an account of a 90-day end to end trek of the Atlas Mountains. In 2008, Brown took a break from writing books on walking when he released The Scottish Graveyard Miscellany, a book about the design and art of gravestones throughout Scotland.