The cities - Perth, Australia, and Aberdeen, Scotland - have received relatively little attention as specific geographical-cultural locales. Often perceived as industrial, isolated and lacking romantic association, they nevertheless have rich historical, narrative and creative traditions that characterise interactions between humans and place, particularly along the length of the four rivers. Anyone who heard the cities Perth and Aberdeen mentioned in the same sentence would likely assume the subject was fossil fuel mining and refining, or perhaps to do with migration and the ongoing nature of the Scottish diaspora. Millions of years after the gas seam or oil deposit was formed the land continues to shape the ways we reside and our relationship to the land and water.