'It puts you in...your place in the universe, infinitesimal.'
I remember one day the lasses dragged me up to Warkworth, on a trip. And I got to the, there’s a little car park behind all the pubs. You have to go down a little alleyway to get to it, and it’s absolutely idyllic there, you’ve got bird life quacking away and fluttering away, and the flow of the river is so slow and serene, and it’s all it was quiet and I says, “Just leave me here, go away, have your walk along the river,” and I sat there for an hour and it was idyllic.
I think it just
took my mind off things, I just sat there like a sponge and absorbed it. Just so rejuvenating it was.
It’s a good safety valve. Let the tension just fall away. Yes, I’m not a city person, I’m always happier
in open country. I used go fell-walking a lot, and to get up on the tops of the Dales, you virtually see the two coastlines, on a good day, and I go, “Oh.” If I was religious, I’d say a comment like being near to God, but it’s far more important than that. It puts you in place, your place in the universe, infinitesimal.
{Interviewer: Did you ever go to Sycamore Gap?}
Kirsty and I went there, because I’ll never forget this guy was walking the Pennine Way, and he walked past us, and just said hello, and obviously, he’s a one to tick off his walks, he’ll get through this as quick as possible so he can tick it off. And away he went down the valley, heading off towards the Scottish Border. Then all of a sudden, Kirsty, she’s howling with laughter, and she’s, “Look at that!” The guy must have been having something to eat and he’d thrown something away. And of course, the sheep followed him, and once one moved towards him, they all came, and he panicked and he was running like hell. He literally dived over the stile, the wall to get away from the sheep. Yeah, that was at Sycamore Gap because it goes straight past the tree, doesn’t it? Yeah, Kirsty was howling with laughter, this guy racing across this field with about 40 sheep following him.
Ron Hutchinson was interviewed in 2025 for the Trees of Hope project.