It is the drowsy hum of bees and the sun on the back of my neck that I remember most vividly. That, and the head-high rows of ripe raspberries which I was allowed to pick as I pleased as I meandered through the cottage garden.

July holidays in Yarrow Feus, a hamlet in the heart of the Borders, were the high point of the family year. Occupying the comb-ceilinged bedrooms of our landlady’s house, and falling asleep to the sound of bleating sheep, we gorged on a cooked breakfast, afternoon tea with drop scones and fruit cake, and a three-course dinner at night that James Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd, who hailed from the neighbouring valley, would have fallen upon after the long trek home from Tibbie Shiels’ Inn. Loathe to leave a crumb untouched, Dad always started the new school term half a stone heavier, and grumpily submitted to starvation rations for a month.

It was worth it. Nowhere we visited while I was a child was as enchanting as this secluded valley, with its views over dumpy hills and billowy woods, and a river alive with fish. Even today, half a century later, the place remains otherworldly in its sense of isolation and tranquillity. The only disturbance comes from occasional RAF fighter jets screaming up the valley on practice runs, whose ear-splitting roar serves to emphasise the exceptional quiet at all other times.

Soon, however, everything is to change. A place with a claim to be one of the loveliest spots in Scotland, rich in wildlife and history yet all but overlooked, will in a short time be irrevocably blighted. If Scottish Power Energy Networks (SPEN) gets its way, a line of pylons as tall as the Scott Monument will march across the fields and hills, carrying electricity cables to a substation near Carlisle. Visitors to the Yarrow valley, drawn by the sense of timeless peacefulness and its unrivalled landscape, will be confronted........

© Herald Scotland