On Travel

“For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel’s sake. The great affair is to move”

 R.L. Stevenson

"Use the quads God gave you!"

American fender sticker, referring to quadriceps rather than quad bikes

Drive through the highlands on a summer weekend, and you will find cars, tents and campfires by every scenic parking place. The Land Reform Act in Scotland allows wild camping, and undoubtedly it is a better way to spend Saturday night than watching The X Factor.

But I still feel these folk are missing out. Research by the Forestry Commission showed that 90% of visitors stay within 200 yards of their car. It’s as if they are attached to it by an umbilical cord.

You can also see this reluctance to leave the vehicle when walking the splendid South West Peninsula Coast Path. Often you will have the path entirely to yourself for miles, but it is easy to tell when you are approaching a coastal settlement - you start seeing people. Once you have gone a quarter mile past the village and car park it is deserted again.

Bill Bryson once observed that every fifteen minutes on the Appalachian Trail, he walked further than the average American did in a week.

On one occasion, Sigurd Olson travelled to a remote lake by float plane – a lake he had previously visited by the methode traditionelle: four days of paddling and four nights of bivouacking. The satisfaction of achievement and feeling of remoteness were no longer there – he had lost more than he had gained.

Remoteness, solitude and wildness depend on distance, but mechanised transport telescopes distance. Even the mountain bike is guilty in this respect. And one of the best guardians against desecration of wild land is the ‘long walk in’.