The weather stops and it becomes beautiful, and I’m sharing a roast dinner with a family in the most idyllic place in the world,” remembers Lewis. Kate gave up a career training teachers and last spring the couple welcomed their newborn son, Magnus, with Kate having walked and wild camped throughout her pregnancy. Christian Lewis had hit rock bottom, suffering with depression so severe he would shut himself in his bedroom for weeks. Then while surfing – his only respite – he cast his eyes along the coastline and realized it was the only place he really wanted to be.

Since Magnus joined them, the couple have slowed in pace, using a van to carry their things and sleep in when needed. Stuck on his own, with a menu consisting of foraged limpets, “which I was sick of eating at this point… I really remember just sort of telling myself: ‘Right, mate, you’ve got to batten down the hatches for Christmas and Boxing Day, everyone’s going to be doing stuff with their families, this is going to be tough. I’d known back then, deep down, that one day, as long as I just kept driving forward, good things could happen, and they did! As I sat on the front of the boat reflecting on the past month, I thought back to the beginning of the walk, though this time with a smile. Five years later, Chris has navigated the West Coast, Northern Ireland, the hard-rock cliffs of Scotland and the perimeters of the Scottish Islands .I knew I still had a long way to go in myself before I felt I was healed from the ghost that I had become, and to eventually feel whole again, but it was evident that with each step I took, each day, week and month that passed, the once dim ember still just about burning inside me was growing into a healthier, more robust flame. Please note, it is the policy of The Shetland Times to publish comments and letters from named individuals only.

Because I knew that whether it’d be changing jobs, changing house, moving to another place, my problems would follow me,” he explains. His sister helped set up a Facebook page for him to document his walk, which he decided to use to raise money for SSAFA, an armed forces charity that supported him during his hardships. Within three days of his life-changing decision, Lewis had gathered the meagre supplies he needed for the trip. He gave himself a few days to rustle up a tent and walking boots, then left for good with just a tenner in his pocket and two days’ worth of food. Five years later, he has navigated the west coast, Northern Ireland, the hard-rock cliffs of Scotland, the perimeters of the Scottish Islands – where he spent three months on the uninhabited island Hildasay with no fresh water or food – and the marshes of the East Coast.Whatever the exact figure, it is an enormous endeavour and one which is the subject of Lewis’s exhilarating book, Finding Hildasay, which he wrote on an A4 pad while walking, and is named after the uninhabited Scottish island where he lived alone for three months during the first Covid-19 lockdown. He needed a reliable internet connection to do this interview and the family, who have followed his journey on social media, offered him their place. I had no gimmicks or things to make life comfortable; no books or any entertainment other than my phone. My foraging skills were something I was getting much better at, and if I had wi-fi, I’d always be jotting down tips in my journal and then putting them into practice.

With a foreword from longtime supporter Ben Fogle, Finding HIldasay is his inspiring true story of reconnecting with nature and finding hope along the way. But to be open to life-changing events, discovering who you are and the real meaning of happiness is extraordinary. We have a very small possibility of living a life on this planet and you’ve just got to bloody make the most of it. And, in the process, he has raised over a quarter of a million pounds for the charity SSAFA, which had been instrumental in helping him a few years beforehand. His “absolute highlight”, though, was the three months he spent on Hildasay, off the west coast of Shetland, during that first lockdown.Finding true happiness was not just about the walk and the adventure; there was so much I needed to learn that would involve going deeper into my mind. I think, realising there are so many people out there like that, too, helped me to feel less shame in myself. Ex-paratrooper Christian Lewis had hit rock bottom, suffering with depression so severe he would shut himself in his bedroom for weeks. Finding Hildasay, read by the author, is a brutal and beautiful true story of depression, survival, walking, and the meaning of home. Almost six years later, Chris has navigated the West Coast, Northern Ireland, the hard-rock cliffs of Scotland and the perimeters of the Scottish Islands.