Hunting Stirling’s naked rambler

WHAT HE MIGHT LOOK LIKE: Not the real rambler

Some students treat it as a bit of a rite of passage to climb the Dumyat peaks near Stirling University and then strip off. I can’t say I’ve ever seen the appeal, but it’s clearly not just students who love to feel the fresh air on their skin.

Police are desperately trying to track down a mysterious man who likes to wander Dumyat completely starkers. There have been several sightings of him in the past few months around the Forth Valley and Ochil hills area. That means it’s a proper hobby, not just a dodgy night on the Buckfast.

We at The Tab walked up Dumyat ourselves to help the police in their investigations by searching the hills. We had little more than a pair of binoculars and a camera in case we caught a glimpse of our man swinging in the wind.

Even with these we couldn’t find him

We do know that this local flesh-menace is certainly not the same man as the legendary Naked Rambler Stephen Gough. Gough was repeatedly arrested for being naked in public and eventually served six years in prison. As soon as he was released he stripped right back off, and is currently serving eleven months in prison for breaching his non-nudity ASBO.

So who is the copycat walker in the buff?

A good poke in the bush revealed nothing

At one point during our search in bushes and behind trees we saw a man in a white van. He was apparently only there to ride a bike – but the fact that he drove when all he wanted to do was cycle could raise some eyebrows.

Man with a van: not a nudist

Dumyat’s birthday-suited wayfarer has been the talk of the WalkHighlands website, where user RTC reckons he only walks in the nude, but is not a nudist the rest of the time: “As far as I am aware he only takes his clothes off while walking in the Ochils. I have yet to meet him personally. I only saw him today from a distance after missing him by a few minutes on the top.”

Perhaps it was the heavy rain or the cold winds, but the only willy The Tab managed to see was the Willy Wallace Monument.

Another user of WalkHighlands said: “The existence of the naked rambler of the Ochils was first brought to my attention by a Dumyat regular, who said he had to stand aside to let him pass at a very narrow point on the path up from Menstrie.

At this point the path is bordered by briars and nettles, so to stand aside was a very Christian thing to do.”

Naked sheep, but no man

Eventually we realised that spending our mid-semester break looking for a naked man in the countryside was a little bit too George Michael for our liking, and we had to leave.

A Police Scotland spokesman has said: “We are keen to trace this male and ask that he get in touch with police to discuss the full circumstances surrounding this matter.”