Tag Archives: Wildcamping
1000 Miles, Part 2: Swansea
It’s time to get down to the task of covering some serious mileage. We pull out a rather good audio book we’ve been listening to set in 18th-century Scotland (read with some beautiful Scottish accents!), while Nettle stoically devours mile after mile. We spend quite a while following the wooded edge of a big picturesque loch north of Glasgow, before … Continue reading
Watching the rain in Perthshire
Having arrived after a quite dramatic introduction to Perthshire, we awake beside our very own loch to howling wind and rain (which kept Katherine up all night and dogged her dreams with visions of a flooding Nettle), and rather quickly our plans for a day-long hike dissolve. To be honest, I’m personally not so shattered at the idea of spending … Continue reading
To Loch Tay
An oft-abroad friend had waxed lyrical about a spot in the lower highlands called Loch Tay, and so it’s there to which we point our trusty steed as we leave the sheep-dotted fields and tidy urban sprawl of Edinburgh. The countryside rapidly increases in prettiness, as we pass by escarpments adorned with ancient-looking rocky buildings that might well have simply … Continue reading
First days in the Lake District
We set out towards the Lake District, scooting around Manchester and then back amongst the emerald fields that are becoming so familiar. Some scouting ahead I did in Google Earth while sitting in a supermarket car park along the way revealed a few possibilities for wildcamping by Lake Windermere, so that’s where we are headed. The roads narrow, and soon … Continue reading
Through the Peak District
To the frustration of my itchy feet, we ended up spending almost a month perched on the outskirts of Birmingham attending to life-overhead — dentist checkups and a Nettle check-up. Eight hundred pounds later and Nettle has new shoes (what those with less anthropomorphised vehicles might refer to as “tyres”). We spent some time before her check-up feeling anxious that … Continue reading
UK-Bound: Seven Countries in Seven Days; Across Europe
Our next day of driving began with our finally leaving Italy, or at least its official boundary. We drove by the lake near the border, emptied for some works on the drained lake bed and looking rather forlorn compared to the beautiful images Google Earth had shown me the day before while I was searching for potential wild-camps; then we … Continue reading
UK-Bound: Seven Countries in Seven Days; Leaving Italy
Sadly, our 3 months of Schengen time was again all used up! We’d booked a ferry from Dunquerque to Dover on the 19th, and we’d left ourselves a week to get there from Padova. So with some wistful thoughts, and looking forward to coming back to spend some time getting to know Andrea, Silvia and their friends better, we set … Continue reading
Kindred spirits in Padova (Padua)
When we started thinking and talking about travelling, one of the things that really interested us was meeting people from other countries and cultures and forming friendships as we went. It was something that really appealed, but it wasn’t really something I was expecting that we would successfully do: We admittedly aren’t extremely social, and we couldn’t really imagine doing … Continue reading
Across Le Marche and Umbria, Assisi
We started our day with a brief walk alongside the lake we found to sleep by, with some nice views over the snowy Apennines. We found a perfect wildcamp just a hundred metres or so up the road, much prettier than where we’d parked — this always happens to us! We got back on the road for another very fine … Continue reading
Penne, forever Penne
Parked in Chieti the morning after the procession, we spent a long time trying to find a place to spend a few days, cheap with electricity and in an area with 3G. This turned out to be a bit tricky and frustrating (especially as our electrical power dwindled away — looks like our 118 amp hour leisure battery is dying … Continue reading
Chieti and the Good Friday procession
Having arrived in the town of Chieti, we found the free parking reserved for campers; the signs at the car park read something like “Agli accampanare Nomadi”, presumably something about being reserved for nomads/Travellers, which would’ve made us a little nervous if it weren’t for the swanky-looking motorhomes parked around. We were there to see the Good Friday procession, apparently … Continue reading