Picture this: dawn breaking grey and pink over the Moray Firth, the tide pulling back off the sand, and ahead of you, somewhere south, the high tops of the Cairngorms waiting under cloud. That is where the Speyside Way begins, and for 86 miles it does not let go.

This is one of Scotland's Great Trails, and it earns the title by following the River Spey itself, from the salt air of the coast right into the heart of whisky country and on into the mountains. It is a route that changes its character almost every hour. You start with gulls and harbour walls, move into farmland and birch woods, and by the closing miles you are climbing into heather moorland with the Cairngorm massif filling the horizon.

The original line ran between Buckie and Aviemore, a route that whisky pilgrims and distance walkers have known for decades. But in 2021 the trail grew. An extension of around 15 miles, roughly 24 kilometres, was added to the southern end, pushing the route on to Kingussie and taking the total distance to about 85 miles, or 137 kilometres. That final stretch is no afterthought. It threads through woodland and open moor and passes the brooding ruin of Ruthven Barracks before the trail finally runs out of road at Kingussie, with the high Cairngorms standing close enough to touch.

For a runner, the appeal is obvious almost immediately. The Spey itself becomes a constant companion, sometimes glimpsed through trees, sometimes running fast and peat dark right alongside the path. There is a rhythm to following a river for that long, mile after mile of moving water setting the pace as the land around it shifts from coastal flatlands to the famous distillery glens and then up into wilder, emptier country.

And the landscape does plenty of the storytelling on its own. This corridor through Speyside is home to some of the most recognised whisky country in the world, the air at times carrying that unmistakable malt sweetness from the distilleries dotted along the valley. Beyond the glens, the trail moves through ancient pinewood remnants, the kind of forest that feels untouched by time, before opening out onto heather moorland where the Cairngorm foothills finally rise into view.

It is exactly the sort of point to point that suits a fastest known time attempt: long enough to test endurance and route management over the best part of a day or more, varied enough in terrain to demand more than one gear, and finishing in genuinely committing country where the weather and the ground both have a say in how the day goes. A GPX track for the full 85 mile line is available for anyone plotting an attempt, mapped out from Buckie to Kingussie.

No times currently stand on record for the standard route, which leaves the Speyside Way as one of those rare things, a fully established, well documented Great Trail still waiting for its first marker to be set. For the right runner, on the right day, with the tide out at Buckie and the Cairngorms holding clear at the far end, that is not a gap. It is an invitation.