I am an Edinburgh-based artist who exhibited in the Walking the Land collective Lines of Enquiry exhibition at the Hardwick Gallery, University of Gloucestershire in Cheltenham. The gallery is situated near the Honeybourne Line, a greenway which used to be a railway. After the opening on 7 March, I made an artwalk from the Welsh / English border to the Symposium which was also at Hardwick and held by Walking the Land.

The Honeydew Line Hardwick Gallery by Tamsin Grainger (work by Chris Bingle to the right)

I walked from Chepstow to Cheltenham through the Forest of Dean, the Severn Plain and the Cotswolds, looking out for the unseen small ones (eg ants who are part of our ecosystem and clear up our rubbish). For 10 days, I noticed, acknowledged, and paid attention to the vital role these not-insignificant members of our community play.

At the end of each day, I visited the home of someone who had taken me up on my offer of a Shiatsu-hospitality exchange. Highlighting the walk in advance on social media, I invited others to accompany me and/or to meet in the evenings / overnight. I was delighted to make the acquaintance of many people I'd never previously met, and others whom I had known before but had not seen for a few or even for 40 years.

With Vicky with whom I exchanged Shiatsu for hospitality @wyevalleyshiatsu Wye Valley Shiatsu

During the walking process, I witnessed the terrible devastation to our soil that we have caused through intensive forestry, extraction, and injurious industrial farming methods. The effects of the recent, more extreme wind, storms and flooding, often attributed to climate change, were experienced every day. They prompted me to recognise our human failing to protect the insects, birds, plants and animals that we have a duty of care towards, and rely on.

Many paths were almost impassable due to logging vehicles, cattle, horses, or flooding. Cotswolds, England

Over the next months, I will be reflecting on the injury to my leg from slipping on the mud while climbing May Hill at the end of a 10-hour-day's trek carrying a heavy pack. The pain I walked with became an embodied manifestation of the state of the crisis we are in. There were times on the tops of hills, when trudging and squelching through mud, that I wondered if I could continue to go on. I had to sit and rest, mindfully. I had to accept the situation, go right into the middle of the extreme discomfort in order to transform the pain that each step caused. I had to hope there was a positive future.

So many broken or fallen trees, Costwolds England March 2025

I will be addressing the idea that this was more than a walk or a wander, perhaps a pilgrimage, and that the act of hope was inherent in the constant need to physically move forwards. I accepted help and occasionally I sewed a small panel instead of giving Shiatsu. I embroidered something I had come across during that day's walk - Melusine (found on the arch of Notgrove Manor) and a periwinkle flower (from the hedgerows). Though I had scheduled one rest day, I had to take a second, a break from the walking. It was lucky for me that I could do that with the help of new and old friends.

Above, Melusine, a figure of European folklore, a female spirit of fresh water in a holy well or river. Left from the gate arch at Notgrove, Cotswolds. Right, my embroidery as an exchange with Eileen Dunlop for hospitality.

Dung flies - appreciating the small things which contribute to our shared ecosystem

This walk has been now been completed. Thanks to all those who walked with me, or who bartered hospitality for Shiatsu. What is Shiatsu?

My route: Chepstow, to Parkend, to May Hill, to Gloucester, and to Crickley. Salperton to Stow-on-the-Wold, to Winchcombe, to Tewkesbury, all along the Gloucestershire Way. Then, to Gloucester on a British Pilgrimage Trust route, and finally to the Walking the Land Symposium in Cheltenham along a Slow Ways route. Total: approximately 124 miles (around 200 kms).

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