Thinker, Sailor, Shepherd, Spy?

. . . a story of remarkable contrasts: From Scapa Flow in 1944 as a seventeen-year-old midshipman, to Tokyo Harbour and the Japanese surrender; from the Royal Cruise to South Africa in HMS Vanguard to climbing the Alps, then sailing the sweltering waters of the Persian Gulf; from studying Russian at Cambridge and in Paris, to the British Embassy in Moscow, the wrong end of a Kalashnikov and Stalin's funeral in Moscow; from the first post-war transit of the Trans-Siberian Railway by Westerners, to navigating a destroyer through a fog-bound minefield in Germany, then working a family farm in Aberdeenshire; from the lambing field at dawn, to late-night sittings in the House of Commons (1966-70) and the Royal Highland (1970-92); from presenting Grampian TV's Country Focus programme for twelve years, to writing four books; from initiating a campaign for a healthier Scotland, speaking in secondary schools from Shetland to the Gorbals and a first parachute jump at sixty-six, to a conservation project on river otters in Chile at the age of seventy-four . . . James Davidson OBE MVO FRAgS tells his story with candour, humour and insight.