Thursday 2 January 2014

Why?

There are many good reasons to take a few days to go exploring with your tent in the highlands. Here I've tried to explain a few.
Needless to say I've omitted the many reasons why you may wish not to, because that would just spoil the surprise.




1. Because it's the law! Or at least, not against the law, at least, so long as you aren't camping in someone's back garden, and its not the stalking season, and you're not actively destroying the hills with a bulldozer* and you're not tickling trout (I have no idea what that last one is either, but apparently it's very illegal. Dirty beggars).



2. Because you don't need a car. Scotrail can take you everywhere in comfort, and with a warm tin of extortionately priced Tennent's thrown in. Bonus adventure points for linking two different train lines together in a trip. Double bonus points for finding the secret super cheap fares on the Scotrail website. Result!



 3. Shiny things! Run out of stuff to waste your money on and annoy your partner with? Then welcome to the world of lightweight camping. More titanium and kevlar than you could shake a carbon fibre walking pole at..

 

4. New pubs. The smallest, the dirtiest, the most remote and the most spectacular. You can spend time in them all, meet all sorts of folk and re-tell all your best lies/stories.


5. Staying in bothies. Like hostels only free, but with no facilities. Or lights. Plus they have mice.



6. The morning after the night before. It may have been dark, wet, and 2am when you pitched your tent, but waking up to new surroundings the next morning cannot be beaten. Unless you're hungover, in which case you will question the wisdom of pitching your tent behind the Kingshouse Hotel...



7. Because it's there! Or, in the case of perfect, sinuous, unbroken Highland singletrack, because it might be there. Seen a dashed black line on an Ordnance Survey map? Could it be the perfect undiscovered mountain descent? Only one way to find out!


 
Stay tuned for more reasons as and when they occur to me!



*Unless you're a wealthy landowner of course...

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